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gofancyninjaworld · 3 years

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OPM Webcomic Chapter 141 Review

Intro

Normally I like to take a couple of days and a few rereads to see how I feel about a chapter before reviewing it, but with ONE’s unpredictable schedule, I’d best do this now. It’s longish.

The first thing to say is that this chapter really messed me up.

The cavalry has a stone in its shoe

The first thing that fucked me up was realising what the sound effect in the first two panels of the chapter was: the sound of the doctor’s increasingly agonised breathing. What a horrible thing to have to hear, made worse by the three Machine Gods showing up and reporting that their latest kill would have a 0% chance of survival after 5 minutes.

If you thought then that this chapter would be about a by-the-skin-of-the-teeth save, you’re sadly mistaken. Genos was awesome. He spared no power (nor powers for that matter) in fighting the three dragon-level machines simultaneously, aiming to kill them as quickly as he could and get that time.

ONE’s grasp on choreography has improved immensely and he’s used it fantastically here. He’s always been versatile, but this time, Genos was plasticity itself, wielding heat, freezing, magnetism, anti-gravity, electricity and much more. In turn, they didn’t commit the mistake of trying to attack one at a time, analysing his moves as they went and attacking in unpredictable formation.

it might not be psychic power, but being able to move and warp anything magnetic is a damn useful substitute

Machine Gods may vary in form, but they do share a basic interest, which is in understanding heroes, and a basic personality, which is a snarky wit that’s quick to mock. Machine God Tech lobs a back-handed compliment to Genos, saying that if he’d mastered these variable abilities, he’d have been able to aim for the top of the hero world. For their confidence, Tech and Ray end up dead in pretty short order, smashed to pieces, leaving an outraged Machine God Body howling about how it simply couldn’t be that a mere ex-human cyborg could outdo them, these magnificent AIs. He takes up the components of the other two to strengthen himself further, but he’s dead soon, smashed to bits by an appropriately named Final Smash.

Genos hurries to the doctor, but there’s no let up. Seven more high-powered robots appear. Thankfully so does Saitama, still in his underwear. He takes on the five approaching from the front, leaving the last two to Genos. Saitama casually walking through the assault, not even bothering to shape a punch has to be one of the scene-stealers of the chapter and one of the very few light moments in it.

And then it’s over. Saitama picks the doctor up to try ferrying him to hospital, but the doctor refuses, preferring to tell Genos where to find a secret, final upgrade, to use it to run away from Them (looks like the doctor knows exactly who killed him) and to beg forgiveness.

what a way for a beautiful relationship to end

Genos doesn’t say anything. Nor does he hurry after Saitama, but after the latter has left, he bows deeply in gratitude and says that there’s nothing to forgive, for the old man did nothing wrong in his eyes.

The action recommences at dawn. For the avoidance of all hope, we see that Saitama has buried the doctor in the forest with a chunck of the lab wall as a headstone and the shovel still stuck in the earth by the grave. Genos comes out of the repair pod with a new body and the two of them take their leave. Genos intends to take out Metal Knight immediately, before whatever the plan for a ‘general offensive’ is executed. Saitama agrees to accompany him. But as they walk along, there’s a light over the nearest city. It seems ‘The Plan’ Machine God Tech talked about has begun.

Indeed, on the ground, there’s carnage as a formation of robots marches through, burning every building they pass and shooting down anything that moves. Various heroes look on in numb horror as the army advances.

That’s where this monster of a chapter ends.

never ones to half-ass things

Meta

Unsurprising Surprise

The Organization strikes at last. Our longest-running villains finally show their hand. They’ve measured, they’ve planned, they’ve done their homework, made that list and checked it twice. Fitting in with Metal Knight’s warning about a shadowy power waiting its time (in the manga, not the webcomic), they’ve struck right when the heroes are at their weakest. We don’t know the extent of it. Is City W the only place being scrubbed off the map, or is this part of a much more widespread trend?

Well, now we really do know that when Genos spoke of not only acting for himself when he introduced himself to Saitama, he was just telling the truth. He might be looking for vengeance, but his scope was always much bigger than just himself. It’s a shame things have had to deteriorate to this extent for us to see it.

If not now, when?

So this is it! This is as good as it gets for him then. If he is to survive, Genos will have to take a page from Drive Knight’s example and quickly master everything his new body has to offer. We’ve (well I’ve) complained before that he’s merely competent at using what the doctor gives him, throwing parts and bodies away without giving himself a chance to truly get the best out of them. No choice now. And it looks like there’s a world to save -- no time to luxuriate in practice. Or grief.

Forgive me

A few years ago when I was still new to Reddit, one of my first posts was to ask if Dr Kuseno was a good man. Against his manifest good deeds in supporting Genos as he did, it didn’t sit well with me that he’d performed a Reverse Pinocchio on an ordinary boy, turning him into a living weapon. Not hard to imagine that it wasn’t received too well by the sub, lol. In time, as we got to see more of Kuseno, my position on him softened, but what the hell, doctor? never went completely away.

With Kuseno’s dying words being apology, we see that he knew he’d done wrong by Genos. He knew that roping him into his quest for justice came as much from his own selfishness and rage as it did from a desire to set the world to rights. I’ve repeatedly said that the cyborg body Genos has has nothing to do with health. It was all about gaining the power to fight and forgoing a chance to have a life in the process.

And so Kuseno died, in agony, weeping and begging for a forgiveness that he never heard come. He was buried like a dog in what had been his backyard. By a stranger.

Fuck.

That’s cold.

Now I’m not faulting Genos for not forgiving the old man to his hearing. But there’s a hardness to him that he’ll want watching lest it grow more.

this is why the Machine Gods always fail despite their detailed calculations. They just do not understand the depth of the human heart, nor its importance.

But I’ll add one more thing. Dr Kuseno did not just raise a warrior. In the end, he raised a damn fine hero too. In the end, I really hope that some great good might yet come out of this.

Saitama and compassion

I’m glad that Saitama is here. I’m even more glad that he’s not been acting to try stealing the show, instead supporting Genos when the latter needs it. It’s not ‘I’m sorry for your loss’ But it is compassionate.

What’s next?

Why fighting of course. Lots of it. I hope that somehow, the fog of war ends up nevertheless clarifying the relationship between the Neo Heroes, The Organization, Metal Knight and possibly Drive Knight. I’m ready for this arc to build to its crisis and resolve one way or the other.

Bits and pieces

Number 23 on the list? If Kuseno weren’t keeping such a low profile, I’d be insulted on his behalf.

I surmised last chapter that Kuseno must have an extensive basement as the superstructure of his place looked positively humble. West basement? With multiple hangars? That’s not a basement, that’s an underground castle. I hope Genos has locked up after himself. If he succeeds in putting sword to his enemies, he’ll want what’s in there.

Finally, with the way living and dying works in this world, I wonder if the old man might yet have survived if he’d not decided it was too late for him. I guess we’ll never know. At least I hope not. I hope he’s beyond the clutches of those who’d raise him to an undeath for their own purposes.

#OPM #meta #review #Genos #dr kuseno #Saitama #machine gods #The Organization #Metal Knight #long #what a brutal chapter #both in action and in emotion #so much ugliness #all I wanted Genos to be able to do was to finally protect someone that was important to him but even now it wasn't to be #and yet I do hope that there's some redemptive good that might be wrought out of this

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miss-choco-chips · 4 years

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I saw this post https://dametsunax27.tumblr.com/post/616421151376359424/broke-tim-is-the-smart-one-bart-and-kon-are#notes from @dametsunax27 and couldn’t control myself. This makes no sense whatsoever. I’m sorry in advance.

One would think Tim Drake was the ultimate impulse control keeping his trainwreck of a team from going off the rails and burn.

One would be halfway wrong.

---.---

Cyborg is giving Kon lessons on how to beat ass at video games (and enjoying making it stick by thoroughly kicking his and goading about it like only a Titan could) when Dick’s little brother and now his teammate, Tim, Red Robin, stumbled out of the elevator. Dark glasses slightly askew let one catch a glimpse of his wide, pupil-blown blue eyes, and hair a utter mess; it was an understatement to say he was automatically worried.

Had he just been on a fight? But he didn’t seem beat up, or out of breath, so that couldn't be. He also didn’t look sick, but something was definitely off about him. Cyborg had never seen the teen look anything but perfectly poised, though a case could be make on how he always ever saw him during serious hero business. This could be usual Red Robin behaviour, for all he knew… still, this was Dick’s little brother, and if anything happened to him under Cyborg's watch, the unbidden rage of one Nightwing would fall on him and that wasn’t a pretty thing to receive, so he didn’t hesitate to pause the game and shoot Kon a worried look.

Said meta didn’t even seem phased, attention split between his frozen, half dead character on screen, and his apparently crazy friend.

-What’s up? -he asked, half turning to watch the small vigilante approach, when it was evident Cyborg wouldn't unpause the game until this was solved- Cracked a case? Finished a new game?

-Conner -Tim obviously tried to whisper, but ended up shouting halfway through the name; he also completely bypassed him, something the polite, all around good kid wouldn’t do unless in dire circumstances- Get ready. We are going out.

Cyborg tilted his head, looking around. There was no one else here, and Tim wasn’t suited up. This couldn't be a mission… right?

Kon didn’t move from the couch, eyes squinted as if trying to decide something- Going where, bud?

-Nasa. We are rescuing the Aliens.

While that was a perfectly normal sentence to be said among superheroes who could and had traveled to literal space for missions, something didn’t quite make sense for Cyborg. Maybe it was the fact that Kon barely even blinked, instead looking like his suspicious had been confirmed.

-Uh huh. Which aliens?

-ET and its people, of course. We are gonna raid not only area 51, but all the other ones.

The meta just sighed, giving up and letting his controller back on the table in front of the couch.

-When was the last time you slept for more than thirty minutes at a time, buddy?

Tim threw both hands up- That doesn’t matter right now, Kon! The aliens need us! I’m calling Bart, you obviously can’t grasp the situation’s severity.

-No, wait, don’t/ -but it was too late, Tim already had his phone at hand, and he evaded all of Kon’s attempts at taking it away with a grace very specific of his family, but very surprising considering he was one step down from feral.

Bart was with them half a second later.

-DudethisissocrashIlovehowyouthinklet’sgosavesomealiens!

-No!

Once again, Conner was ignored. He slumped back into the couch, looking at the ceiling like a man deep into despair.

-Can you hack them? -a new blink and Bart seemed ready to go, butterfly net at hand and Indiana Jones hat above his massive mane of hair. His other hand had a very suspicious plastic bottle, that Cyborg quickly recognized as a very, very sweet and caffeine imbued drink- We can probably use some blueprints to know where to go to find the aliens fast and free them.

-Already ahead of you. I haven’t seen any containment units, but there’s some open spaces that could be hiding underground prisons. We are going to check that out first.

At this point, Conner just seemed tired. He got up from the couch again and slowly but steadily approached the plotting geniuses as the talked about possible traps and battle strategies. Cyborg knew, on a superficial level, that Bart was, like, very smart and Tim was a veritable genius; but he hadn’t been quiet aware they were chaotic. Apparently, sugar rush and sleep deprivation pushed them both to… this.

Should he call Dick? There was still some responsibility to be taken from not making Tim sleep -or noticing how unhinged he was getting- before, but surely his old friend wouldn't blame him for something that, according to Kon’s face, was a normal occurrence.

-...And then, we look into the Director’s personal life, find his family, and take his wife hostage! Or husband, whatever, we ain’t letting heteronormative thinking stop us!

-Are you using that word right?

-I think so, yes.

-Good, you get extra points for that one.

-Sweet.

-Should we also kidnap their kids, if they have them? I won’t feel comfortable about taking our answers from them, but their parents don’t know how far are we willing to go, so we can just bluff our way around it.

-Oh, oh! You can do the Batman voice! It’ll scare them so much, they’ll shit their pants without us even getting physical! And we won’t even need to take their children!

-No, we do need to. You know how I feel about backup plans.

-But you just said you don’t like the idea.

-I don’t remember which word I started this sentence with, Bart, don’t come at me with something I might or might not have said a few seconds ago.

The tired meta, who had been slowly and quietly approaching them, was finally close enough to snatch both their smaller bodies around the waist, tucking them under his arms and carrying them like that.

-I’m pretty sure half of what you two plotted somehow violates the Geneva convention. Crime is bad, remember Rob?

Tim looked up at him, wide eyes over the rim of his dark glasses, blinking like butter wouldn't melt on his mouth. He was completely pliant, letting Kon float them all towards the elevator. Bart, on his part, trashed like a half feral cat, hissing and spitting.

Cyborg distantly thought they’d be needing to disinfect the floor. Again.

-No! Kon, my man, you can’t stop us! We are freeing your people!

-ET isn’t my people. Or real.

-BLASPHEMY! Tim! Buddy, back me up. We said we were gonna free the aliens!

Tim tilted his head, glasses almost falling off, and stretched his neck enough he could see Bart at the other side of Kon’s broad chest.

-...who are you again?

-TIM, NO, COME BACK, I NEED UNHINGED TIM TO HELP ME FREE THE ALIEN FROM OUR TYRANNICAL GOVERNMENT. KON, BUDDY, WE MIGHT BE VIOLATING SOME LAWS, BUT YOUR-

-Not mine.

-YOUR PEOPLE ARE BEING UNLAWFULLY OPPRESSED AND DETAINED, AND WE NEED TO…

Cyborg couldn't hear whatever followed, as the elevator’s door closed. The living room was once again in silence.

Cyborg was having an out of body experience.

What the fuck?

#Tim Drake #kon el kent #bart allen #Kon is the mom friend #my writting #young justice #teen titans #Tim needs to sleep #Kon needs to sleep too now #maybe they'll take a nice lil nap togheter #with bart squished under Kon #cyborg #Tim and bart are UNHINGED CHAOTIC GENIUSES

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kannra21 · 3 years

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If some anime onlys want to spoil the 5th season for themselves then this is your Pandora box, enjoy!

So the last episode of season 4 is manga chapter 190. Endeavor won the fight although he's heavily bleeding so Hawks comes to his aid and teases him for using the same pose as All Might but then, surprise; Dabi is arriving on the scene. The thing is, Dabi sent the nomu to fight Endeavor so that he could finish him off when Endeavor's at his most vulnerable state. Hawks also couldn't fight since Endeavor burned most of his feathers. Miruko comes to the rescue in the last minute and Dabi said "welp fuck that" so he disappeared. Later in the day, Hawks and Dabi meet in the abandoned factory. Hawks is angry bc Dabi acted out of their plan- Dabi was supposed to send the nomu to a different location, not in the middle of the city. He also noted that the nomu was on a completely different level from the ones they've seen so far. Hawks is working for the league and he was supposed to bring some random strong guy to fight the nomu in order to test its abilities, but he chose Endeavor who got damaged pretty badly and is now recovering in the hospital. In reality, Hawks is spying on the league bc the hero commission told him so. Dabi is still suspicious of Hawks, he doesn't trust him but he told him that they'll stay in contact. Later Hawks is arriving to the hospital to check on Endeavor, he's smiling but his eyes are smudged on the corners, meaning that he was crying because he felt guilty for indirectly hurting Endeavor. Later on we find out about Hawks' past. As a little kid he saved some random people from a car crash. From a very young age he was super fast and that's how the hero commission heard of him and wanted to meet him. Hawks' family is very poor and the commission decided to take him under their wing, they also promised to take care of his family. Since then Hawks became a child soldier, he was groomed into becoming a perfect hero. But he feels trapped, like a bird in a cage. He doesn't feel free at all but as long as he can accomplish his dream- to achieve a society where heroes can enjoy their free time, then he'd be happy, even if it meant that he had to dirty his hands in the process.

The next day Endeavor arrives home. Natsuo, Fuyumi and Shouto are having their first family dinner. Endeavor has a permanent scar on his face, the same side Shouto has his burn mark. Shouto is very indifferent towards this and continues slurping his noodles. Natsuo is angry at Endeavor bc he and Shouto finally got to learn more about each other since they couldn't interact much bc Endeavor isolated Shouto from his siblings. He's yelling at him and getting out of the house. Endeavor is taking it all, he knows he deserves it. Fuyumi is sad and wishes for their family to get better. Fuyumi is trying very hard for their family and to remain as optimistic as she possibly can.

Deku's dreaming of ofa users from the end of season 4. We get All Might flashback where Nana's dying and transferring ofa to All Might. Gran Torino is training him afterwards and the two are talking about All Might's lack of experience. All Might goes to America after he graduates. And the flashback ends. Deku talks to All Might about his strange dream of ofa users and All Might is concerned in the beginning but reassures him and tells him that they'll figure it out together. Since Bakugou already knows about ofa Deku and him are training together. Aizawa and Shinsou are coming out of the break room and Aizawa held a meeting at Ground Gamma (training faculty). There're class a and class b at the gathering and they're having joined training in a way that they're being divided into groups. Shinsou is invited bc he's hoping to transfer to the hero course and everyone is surprised. Shinsou declares that he's not wishing to make any friends but you can see Midoriya's determined "I'll befriend you" look. Monoma also wants to befriend Shinsou bc he feels like he can relate to their Quirks both being perceived as villainous. The joint training begins and long story short- Deku gets a new Quirk called Black Whip but he can't control it well so there's chaos on the field but Shinsou and Uraraka manage to save him. Bakugou gets character development bc he saved Jirou from getting attacked by the opponent's team. Afterwards the teachers are evaluating each group's teamwork, class a wins. After that Aizawa tells everyone that Shinsou will definitely transfer to the hero course when they all become 2nd years. It's still unknown if he'll transfer to the class a or b. Aizawa talks to Monoma and asks him if he could pay a visit to Eri tomorrow. Eri meets Monoma for the first time and she's kinda scared but Mirio is joking ab it, calling Monoma "the dark side of ua". Monoma is totally unswept and being fabulous as always. So they enter the house and Aizawa tells him to try to copy Eri's Quirk. A small horn appears on Monoma's head and he's pretty but he says that he can't copy her entire ability since he only copies the bare-bones essence of a Quirk. That's also the reason why he couldn't copy Deku's ofa, only green lightnings that casually appear around his body. Deku is internally glad for Monoma bc he's sure, if Monoma ever managed to copy ofa, that he'd have a bunch of broken bones and we can see Deku sweat-dropping on the thought of it. Aizawa says it's a shame that Monoma couldn't manage to copy her Quirk bc he thought that Monoma could teach her how to use it but since it's not possible they need to find another way. Eri feels like a burden but Deku comforts her and she's smiling again.

It's early December and snow is starting to fall. Class a is excited in the dormitories and Tsuyu is going into hibernation when she feels too cold. We find out that Sero and Todoroki share the same taste in manga. Yes the boys are reading mangas. Bakugou and Todoroki still need to finish their license course so we see the two together with Inasa and Camie again. Gang Orca's having enough of them (he loves them). Class a is commenting on Todoroki and Bakugou while they're away and Kaminari says that getting his license was the only time he ever beat the two at anything. He adds "how sad" and wow such a roast king. Long story short Todoroki and Bakugou accomplished their task- they fought together against some small gang belonging to a criminal organization called meta liberation army and YEA HORIKOSHI IS INTRODUCING US NEW VILLAINS HOORAY. All Might approaches the two after they got their licenses and he's congratulating them by ruffling their heads. Bakugou is disgusted and Todoroki's having a soft smile.

BACK TO THE VILLAINS! The title changes from MY HERO ACADEMIA to MY VILLAIN ACADEMIA, so yea this part is only about the villains. Shigaraki's hair grew longer, he's missing Kurogiri, they're broke bc Giran's away and Dabi's arriving with no newbies since he burns everyone he meets on his way so his search doesn't make that much sense. They need to find the doctor afo often interacted with when all of a sudden, boom, a monstrous-like creature appears out from the ground called Gigantomachia and Shigaraki needs to prove his worth as afo's successor. The league appears in the doctor's underground lab and the doc is supposed to prepare Shigaraki for the future challenges. Shigaraki asks doctor to reproduce his Quirk erasing bullets and the doc asks Shigaraki about his motivations for becoming the world's symbol of destruction. Shigaraki's having flashbacks of his and afo's time together. We get a glimpse of Shigaraki's past and we found out, when his Quirk manifested for the first time, that he accidentally killed his entire family one night and the hands he's having on his body are actually his family's hands. He's living with guilt for the rest of his life. He ended up on the streets and he was asking random civilians for help but everyone ignored him. Afo found him and that's how he ended up becoming the successor of the world's greatest villain. Shigaraki hates afo bc he's an evil prick, but he also hates the entire hero society bc everyone let him down when he needed them the most.

Shigaraki had a good heart as a kid, his own sister compared him to All Might. His grandma is Nana Shimura and he also loved heroes very much. He was basically Deku turned evil. Nonetheless, Shigaraki still has a good heart bc he cares ab his friends. Because of his never-ending hate for the hero society and everything that breathes, he decided to destroy the world and doctor was like "ok u passed the vibe check". The league gets out of the lab and for a month and a half Shigaraki doesn't sleep and fights Gigantomachia. Since Gigantomachia's primary target is his master's successor, the rest of the league is taking shifts and trying to help Shigaraki out. Shigaraki thinks he's close to beating the giant but then Twice's phone rang and it turns the new villain organization kidnapped Giran and held him hostage in their hideout in a mountainous area called Deika City. The league is having enough of their bullshit so they decide to go save their man. Long story short, meta liberation army (mla) is a large, powerful villain organization that follows the philosophy that the free usage of Quirks is a basic human right and emphasizes liberation over regulation. The original meta liberation army was founded and led by the infamous Destro and the current army was founded and led by his son Re-Destro, Rikiya Yotsubashi. Long story short, Toga fights against a pretty lady with a landmine Quirk and she kills the lady, her name was Chitose Kizuki, also known as Curious. Toga's Quirk evolves bc she can now copy Quirks alongside appearances. Dabi is fighting a boy with an ice Quirk, his name is Geten. He has a striking resemblance to Rei Todoroki since he has a shoulder-length white hair and long white lashes. Dabi's fight with Geten was the first time he started using his Quirk more earnestly and the city is basically in ice and fire. Geten has very similar beliefs to Endeavor and thinks that people with strongest Quirks deserve the best things in life and Dabi becomes angry. Tbh this is the first time Dabi drops his mask of boredom and indifference. Shigaraki fights against Re-Destro and his Quirk evolves. Shigaraki basically disintegrated the entire city and lov wins. The newer army later merged with the league to form the paranormal liberation front. It's a big ass criminal organization and Shigaraki's the absolute ruler of it all. Later the lieutenants are divided into squads and Dabi and Geten are put together which is hilarious and iconic. Shigaraki comes later to the doctor’s and is being put into a large lab tube for the next 4 months where he's developing a Quirk- afo. After these 4 months there's going to be a war between heroes and villains.

#boku no hero academia #my hero academia #bnha #mha #spoilers #manga spoilers #season 5 #i'm tired so i'm going to sleep #bye #league of villains #lov

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educated-ella · 3 years

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Battle Tendency review

(Image courtesy of Shueisha)

Set in 1939, Battle Tendency follows Joseph Joestar, a lazy yet brilliant Ripple user and the grandson of Jonathan, and his journey to defeat the Pillar Men, the Aztec gods of fitness a race of vampiric superhumans and the original creators of the Stone Mask. It takes a while for us to get to that point, though; after receiving intel that Nazi soldiers have his parental-figure Speedwagon held hostage, Joseph sets out to beat up some krauts and rescue the old man. Turns out that the only reason he’s being held hostage is due to his knowledge on vampires, and the Nazis have a Pillar Man (named Santana, Santviento in localizations) and a plethora of Stone Masks held captive. Surprise surprise, Santana escapes, and Joseph teams up with Nazi general Stroheim to stop him from eating everyone there. Yes, eating. Not only do the Pillar Men eat humans, but they eat vampires as well. So them awakening after thousands of years of rest presents a bit of a problem. Before defeating Santana, Stroheim informs Joseph that there are three more Pillar Men resting underground in Rome. So Joseph sets off, now joined by the arrogant Caesar Zeppeli, the grandson of Baron Zeppeli and fellow Ripple user. However, the other three Pillar Men, Wham, AC/DC, and their leader Cars (spelled Wamuu, Esidisi, and Kars in localizations), prove to be much more of a threat than either of them had anticipated. Joseph manages to convince them to spare their lives, but at a cost. Namely, two poisoned rings placed in his heart and throat that will break in 30 days unless Joseph defeats Wham and AC/DC and claims their antidote rings. So now Joseph needs to properly train himself in the Ripple so he can save his ass, and maybe save the world from this new threat along the way.

By now you’ve probably noticed some quirks in the names of some of the characters. As a running trend in the series, nearly every character is named after a popular band, song, or musician. This makes for some fun and sometimes clever name choices, but has made the series a bitch to localize due to copyright issues. It’s part of the reason why the series has only recently garnered popularity outside of Japan.

Battle Tendency is just plain fun. Joseph is a much more compelling and interesting protagonist than his grandfather and much more fun to watch in battles, as he delivers snappy one liners and psychologically messes with his opponents. The difference between the two is made abundantly clear by their introductions. When Jonathan is introduced, he comes to the aid of a girl being picked on by a group of bullies, even though he had never met her and was horribly outmatched. During Joseph’s introductory arc, when his opponent has a woman held hostage, Joseph dismissively says he doesn’t care if she dies since he’s never met her. This baffles his opponent and gives him an opportunity to counter attack. He also goes through a definite arc throughout the part, starting as an apathetic, self-centered delinquent and growing into a hero to make his grandfather proud, all while never losing his snarky and hotheaded attitude. This same mentality goes for the rest of the cast as well. While I could care less about Baron Zeppeli from Phantom Blood, his grandson Caesar is the perfect foil to Joseph, being an irritable traditionalist hiding behind the façade of a cool Casanova. They play off of each other extremely well and grow alongside each other, and more importantly, feel like actual characters rather than thinly veiled plot devices. Their mentor, Lisa Lisa, is also hilariously cruel in her methods, essentially throwing Joseph and Caesar down a giant hole and saying “if you two don’t start to get along and climb out of there, you’ll both starve to death” as a part of their training. The villains as well, all of the Pillar Men feel distinct and memorable. Oddly enough, they don’t feel nearly as monstrous as Dio, but this makes them feel all the more threatening. For example, there’s this great little moment where Cars slices the hands off of a drunk driver to prevent him from crashing into a stray dog. Things like this help characterize him and the rest of his kind; they do appreciate the beauty of nature, but only see humans as a source of food. Hell, Battle Tendency managed to make a god damn Nazi soldier likeable. The characterization here is wonderful. This is also the first JoJo part to really feel like JoJo by weaponizing the mundane, both literally and from a meta standpoint.

It’s far from perfect though. Rules of the Ripple feel very lax, with new usages being made up on the fly, often being used once then never again and occasionally even contradicting itself in its rules. This sometimes results in Joseph winning fights only because the plot says he has to, and nowhere is this more apparent than in the ending which, as funny as it is, is more of an asspull than anything in retrospect. The characters are fun, yes, but they aren’t particularly deep. It also starts the trend of characters having their backstories dumped on the reader right before they die, a trend I’ve never been fond of. This is the peak of the early era of JoJo, but I’m very glad that we got what we did next.

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terramythos · 3 years

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TerraMythos’ 2020 Reading Challenge In Review - 9/10s!

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Here's the 9/10 books of this year -- books I really liked but not to the point of perfection.

1. This Is How You Lose The Time War by Amal El-Mohtar and Max Gladstone (Full Review Here)

This is a beautifully-written novella about two women from enemy time travel societies. They start as rivals who pass taunting letters to one another and gradually fall in love with each other through their writing. There’s some really beautiful and interesting locations, and I love the longing and emotion in the letter sequences. I think using a science fiction setting for a love story is super cool; especially with time travel, there’s a sense of predestination not found in other genres. I also like the idea of each author writing one of the two leads, so the style is slightly different between them.

2. The City We Became (Great Cities #1) by N. K. Jemisin (Full Review Here)

Jemisin is a fantastic author and created my favorite series ever (The Broken Earth), so I was stoked to read book one of a new series by her. The concept here is that cities become sentient beings over time given enough people and cultural influence. New York City is about to be born into a human avatar, but something goes wrong. An eldritch foe known simply as The Enemy seeks to sabotage the nascent city and almost succeeds. Proto-avatars of the city’s boroughs have to find their inner power and band together to rescue him and save the city.

I really dig the ensemble cast, especially Manny (Manhattan), Bronca (The Bronx), and New York City himself. The book is also a great middle finger to Lovecraft, as the cosmic horror element is steeped in structural racism and oppression, with the Eldritch Aesthetic being a creepy pale white. Super excited for the next book.

3. Artificial Condition (The Murderbot Diaries #2) by Martha Wells (Full Review Here)

I’ve already said plenty about the Murderbot books on my 10/10 list. I really like this one in particular because it introduces ART, one of the best supporting characters in the series. It’s super interesting to see how Murderbot interacts with a non-human person (or... spaceship. But ART is also a person for sure) similar to itself and I really like the banter and friendship between the two. Like the rest of the novellas, it’s short, but it packs in a lot of story and heart.

4. Rogue Protocol (The Murderbot Diaries #3) by Martha Wells (Full Review Here)

My other 9/10 selection for this series! There is a heavy focus on Murderbot’s past and how far it’s come ever since it freed itself from the company’s mental slavery. This probably has the strongest character development in the series outside of Network Effect, with a genuinely sad and sobering ending.

5. Finch (Ambergris #3) by Jeff VanderMeer (Full Review Here)

I think this book is where I really “got” the Ambergris series; it’s a pseudo-trilogy with a lot of postmodern elements, but this one is the most straightforward. Finch is a fascinating mix of noir, dystopia, and cosmic horror. I even called this “nontraditional cyberpunk”; there��s elements of a surveillance state, underground resistance/revolution, artificial implants/bodily enhancements-- but all related to fungi and eldritch horror.

Anyway, this book stars Finch, a detective working in the city of Ambergris, who is tasked with solving an impossible double-murder case. In his investigations, he soon stumbles upon a web of conspiracy related to the downfall and takeover of the city by the gray caps, the humanoid mushrooms who enslave and oppress the human population. It’s just as weird as it sounds, but if you made it to book three, you'll be plenty familiar with how bizarre the series is. Technically, this book is a standalone, but I recommend reading the other two first as they are integral to understanding the plot.

6. The Last Sun (The Tarot Sequence #1) by K. D. Edwards (Full Review Here)

This is a really impressive debut novel with an interesting world concept and great characters. The idea is that Atlantis was a real thing and got destroyed. The surviving inhabitants decided to build a new city by magically stealing a bunch of buildings throughout the world and transporting them to Nantucket. The result is a cool patchwork urban fantasy setting. There’s a huge tarot motif, hence the series name. It’s also gay!

I fell in love with the excellent character banter, especially between Rune and his soul-bonded bodyguard Brand. While I had some criticisms on the plot structure and a reliance on same-y action scenes, everything else was so good I gave Edwards the benefit of the doubt. And it really paid off in the sequel, which improves on basically everything.

7. The Princess Bride by William Goldman (Full Review Here)

I mean, the movie’s a beloved classic. If you haven’t seen it... go do so? It’s a great adventure story with lots of memorable characters, lines, and moments. Honestly I’m more surprised I hadn’t read the book before, and I’m glad I did. It often felt like an extended cut of the movie, with a few key differences in the frame story and some locations. While I think I like the film just a little more, I appreciate the novel for giving me a broader perspective on the story and characters.

8. A Choir of Lies (A Conspiracy of Truths #2) by Alexandra Rowland (Full Review Here)

A Choir of Lies is a standalone sequel to the book A Conspiracy of Truths and can be read on its own if desired. It stars Ylfing, a fan-favorite character in the previous book. He’s processing grief and depression in the wake of his mentor (the last book’s protag) suddenly abandoning him. A (sort of--it’s complicated) professional storyteller called a Chant, Ylfing tries to make it in the Netherlands-inspired fantasy city Heyrland, and writes a diary about his experiences. However, another Chant has found his manuscript and writes scathing commentary on his decisions in the footnotes.

I had a difficult time getting into this one, as Ylfing is both relatable and infuriating, and a depressed protagonist can be hard to get behind. However, it's well worth sticking through, as the sheer catharsis of Ylfing realizing his horrible mistakes and doing everything he can to fix them is... well, pretty inspiring. Multiple characters own up to their failures, often at great personal cost, for the wellbeing of others. I think it’s a great message, especially reading it in 2020 when the future feels hopeless. A Choir of Lies also has two of the things I liked most about A Conspiracy of Truths-- lots of meta commentary on storytelling, and surprisingly interesting economics.

9. The Harbors of the Sun (The Books of the Raksura #5) by Martha Wells (Full Review Here)

I thought this was a nice finale to the series. It has some satisfying thematic bookends regarding the Fell and Moon’s character development. It’s also probably the most “epic” fantasy of the series, with super high stakes and a broad cast of perspective characters. I have to wonder if there are plans for further books or a different series in this universe, since the setting has a lot of depth and potential. Either way, I really enjoyed it!

10. A Killing Frost (October Daye #14) by Seanan McGuire (Full Review Here)

Another year, another October Daye book! Obviously I like this series if I’m fourteen books in and still reading it. A Killing Frost has some slow-ish pacing, but ramps up a lot in the second half of the story. It’s the conclusion to my favorite storyline in the series -- the redemption arc of Simon Torquill. He’s a really interesting morally gray character, and I think serves as the poster child on how the series plays with the idea of heroes and villains. Also, this book casually drops probably one of the craziest twists in the series at the end, and I am super interested to see the fallout of that.

11. The Edge of Worlds (The Books of the Raksura #4) by Martha Wells (Full Review Here)

This is basically part one of Harbors of the Sun and involves the main cast going on a long journey to an ancient ruin. The first half of the book is pretty slow and probably could have been pared down -- lots of travel sequences. However the second half is super tense and action packed. I found the ancient ruin itself really interesting and creepy, and the book sets up a lot of things that pay off in The Harbors of the Sun.

#2020 reading challenge #taylor reads

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cloudbatcave · 3 years

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Cloud Plays White: Finale

This is a long one, folks, since I realized I had a bit in my notes I had forgotten about and only found after I posted this, lol, so I have now edited it in.

when we last left off I was criticizing Alder for being useless in apprehending Ghetsis and Iris for not just taking me to Drayden’s house herself when it is Right Fucking There.

So I’m still futzing around Opelucid here.

“No way, without pokemon, I’ll be lonely and sad! …but am I just using my pokemon, then?”

wow, seems there’s some brain cells there after all. you keep exercising those, brah.

I run into a guy who thinks that it’s okay for team plasma to take pokemon from weak trainers, even though he considers himself one and feels bad for the people they rob.

There’s another dude in the same room who used to be part of team plasma but left because it was weird for him that everyone thought the same way.

See, I appreciate this part of the game’s writing - I wish there was more stuff like this, people who are conflicted and their viewpoints being front and center instead of the simplistic garbage we’re fed by Iris and Alder and company.

Though there’s an absolute nut job who says that despite the years he’s trained with his pokemon he’ll let it go if it makes it a perfect being and I am just not even gonna unpack all the lunacy there.

There’s a kid who thinks that just because N has the legendary pokemon, he must be the hero.

I am very concerned about everyone in Unova being so gullible.

“Your Scrafty looks like it can try a little harder.”

WELL FUCK YOU TOO RANDOM LADY??? LAD DOES HIS BEST AND I WILL NOT HAVE HIM SLANDERED THIS WAY

I finally go to Drayden’s and get told how the original dragon performed mitosis and now we have two dragons and also they once destroyed the region with fire and lightning but it’s chill.

“People may hurt pokemon even more by imposing their selfish thoughts on them. But no matter what, Pokemon and people believe in each other, need each other, and will continue to live together…”

Drayden is smarter and more nuanced than like, anyone else, why is he not a main character.

Iris chips in about how much she can’t forgive Plasma and Drayden mentions they don’t know how to wake up Zekrom.

Well, to be fair, I’d be very surprised if they did.

Off to the gym, this’ll be interesting since I have no ice or dragon moves on my team.

I get through the trainers okay, now time to fight Daffodil.

Her Haxorus was a bit tricky but nothing I couldn’t handle, and when I walk out Juniper shows up.

And somehow she knows how to resurrect Zekrom. Cool!

She blahs about how it’ll wake up when it deems someone worthy and talks about how much I’ve changed and shows me to the gate where the route to the pokemon league is.

“Chirae? Do you regret setting out on your pokemon journey?”

UH.

MAYBE?

mmm, that’s not fair to my pokemon though - nigh everyone around me may be looney tunes or incompetent, but they’ve been good pals.

So I hit “no” after all.

and she gives me a master ball. dope.

I make it to the gates of victory road and I honestly really like the bit where each section of them is themed after the badges! That’s a nice touch, I think that was only also done in the FRLG remakes if I recall correctly. It makes it feel a lot more ceremonious and important.

Ah here come my two idiots.

Bianca asks Cheren to smile and he’d probably implode if he did. He finally isn’t an asshole though, good for him.

The bug badge guard tells me to “fight valiantly like an insect” which is funny but I guess does make sense. Ants can fuck some stuff up, man.

Honestly I want to be a badge gate guard, seems like a fun job.

Also, I caught an excadrill in a raid the day I wrote this, and caught an excadrill in this game. Their pokedex entry includes this gem:

“Their tunnels can be destructive to subway systems”

Given the battle subway exists in this game, their insurance payments must be obscene. Imagine getting your match interrupted by a giant mole with metal fists that doesn’t give a fuck.

I named her Beans. She looks like a Beans.

I also caught a Deino. The Irate Pokémon that can’t see and tackles people to learn about its surroundings. I feel a kinship with this creature.

I named him Mezzo for laughs.

And I managed to get myself back to the beginning of victory road. Good job, cloud.

Okay I think I’ve found the right path, found a new dude to beat up which is a good sign. Apparently he’s lost too.

Love when a trainer switches out to a Pokémon mine doesn’t have a type advantage against and it gets wiped in two hits anyway. Death is inevitable.

“I’ve thought about what I can do to help my Pokémon win and I finally figured out the answer!”

Is it git gud?

Flame charge raises my speed, opponent’s klang uses automotize to prove it can do that too, dies because it’s too busy trying to go fast.

Then I get nailed by a flare blitz. Darmanitan is toxic to gen 5 nuzlocke runs, I swear. Especially since I have no one on my hodgepodge team resistant to fire. At least my unfezant is faster.

“Read what your opponent wants to do. Your opponent is human and may change plans from moment to moment. Be careful!”

There’s some meta joke to be made there but I’m not thinking of anything witty. Something something AI having a point even if not in this context.

Back to the beginning again but I think I know what I need to do now.

I looked at a walkthrough to check, tho, lmfao. Was tired of climbing up there only to fall down the wrong spot.

“There’s an item at the bottom! Do you want to slide all the way down?”

You’re the devil talking and you tempt me but I will ignore your silver tongue for now.

So I’m at the league and I thought Cheran would pop out of the bushes before I got here. That’s weird. I could swear he fights me one last time before I challenge the elite four.

NO CHERAN. OKAY. WHAT. IS MY GAME GLITCHED??

I guess not! Huh.

All right then. Time to try and see if I can win with my very unbalanced team.

Lmfao yeah my first attempt against the ghost trainer crashed and burned. Literally, thanks to her Chandelure. Very glad I saved on the outside. TIME TO GO TRAIN MORE.

No Marty, you may not learn wild charge, this is a no recoil moves household, self harm is bad.

Some grinding later, I am ready to try again.

Shauntal gave me a little trouble but was much more manageable. Grimsley was easy, only his Krookodile gave me issues.

I really like the elite four battle areas in this gen, I do admit. Very aesthetic.

Ah shit I know that Musharna is coming.

Never mind, that pink and purple snoozeball went down easy. I didn’t have a single Pokémon faint.

Unless Marshal breaks the trend the fights have actually gotten easier as I went.

He actually was a bit tricky, gave me a good show.

Hello endless stairs, hello N and Alder, hello giant random castle that just explodes out of the ground somehow.

“What has just appeared is team plasma’s castle”

Thanks mate, never would’ve figured that out without you. Why do you need a castle.

Oh wow, the gym leaders finally decided to be useful and fight the sages for me instead of letting extremists wander around unchecked.

Thanks y’all! Trying not being pointless more often!

“Ignoring team plasma...that would be a terrible thing for us gym leaders to do.”

You all already did that, Elena. I watched as Clay and Iris let these assholes go. We could have avoided this whole plot if literally any of you had done more earlier.

So the game says the castle was built by the Pokémon team plasma took but how the fuck did they like...work underground...you know what I’m not gonna even think about it too hard because it makes no sense and I know that. I must make my peace.

I also like how the castle is nonsensical and yet there’s a line of dialogue about how they’ll liberate the Pokémon in PCs too for their Master Plan(TM), which is surprisingly thoughtful. This game is so inconsistent with how much sense its lore makes. It’ll come up with something clever and then wear its underwear on its head the next minute.

“Will you go the Pokémon league?”

Hey what - WHY DID YOU TELEPORT ME HOW CAN YOU DO THAT. DO YOU HAVE AN ABRA OR WHAT

THAT WAS RANDOM

Well at least there’s someone there to randomly teleport me back too.

WHEEEEEE

Hi Reshiram, convenient how that mini fire tornado you made didn’t burn me or N.

Hi Zekrom, convenient how your lightning didn’t hurt us either, you’re a considerate chap

Aight, let’s see if I can catch this bastard

...I did and it only took me like five balls. Okay then.

N gave me a good fight, so there’s that.

Love how Ghetsis’s bouffalant kills itself via recoil from its own move and my scrafty’s rocky helmet.

He gave me a good fight too though.

I do like the ending, despite my issues with how the game presents its message. N is a great character and I appreciate what Nintendo was trying to do with the game’s plot, they just...didn’t really delve into it like they should have.

I’m glad I replayed it. I still have my issues with gen 5 but I see a lot more of its positives now.

We’ll see if I do any post-game content, I have gotten kind of attached to my grump-ass trainersona and his weird team.

#Chirae the mistrustful teen and his pokemon #cloud plays white

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aion-rsa · 4 years

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Doom Patrol Season 2 Episode 7 Review: Dumb Patrol

https://ift.tt/3eT5rvb

This Doom Patrol review contains spoilers.

Doom Patrol Season 2 Episode 7

As its title suggests, Doom Patrol gets pretty dumb this week when the manor experiences an infestation of microscopic beings that feed off of bad ideas, but which reveals Miranda to be an effective primary. Meanwhile, Cliff rockets back to Earth, and vows endlessly to kill the Chief, who is seeking answers in the Yukon, and Rita decides to shadow the Cloverton beekeeper for her community theater role. And once again, Doom Patrol hits us with a silly episode that still manages to push character development forward – even for Willoughby Kipling — and unveils more of Chief’s plan for Dorothy.

“Dumb Patrol” introduces the pink-skinned microscopic beings the Scants which, as a 1950s health class PSA from the Knights Templar explains, implant very bad ideas into infected humans, who then produce “uma-jelly” upon which the creatures feed. Bad ideas as a weapon is incredibly effective, it turns out (and is quite tasty, if the Scant Queen played by Jhemma Ziegler is to be believed).

After some Scant mist inspire Larry, Vic, and Roni to open a crate from the Eismann Gallery marked “Do Not Open” on the front, the back, and the sides – all caps, underlined – we’re treated to great comedic moments where our typically dour characters can get goofy.

(As an aside, the Eismann Gallery “somewhere in Switzerland” is likely a reference to Horst Eismann from the Doom Patrol comics who collects bizarre objects, and who Kipling claimed in the first episode of the season to possess enough magic to return the team to normal size.)

Despite Miranda’s fairly sound advice that Captain Trainor should give his family space, he asks for her to ring up Flit from the Underground – where they both teleport into the hospital where Larry’s grandson was held. The normally morose Larry goes from Negative Man to Positive Man as he chipperly announces himself as “Doctor Trainor” with a lab coat, and almost gets captured by the Bureau of Normalcy.

Meanwhile, Vic and Roni’s relationship, already moving way too fast to be believed, shifts into a whole new gear with them agreeing Vic should just perform surgery on her to remove her tech (an idea Larry is more certain of than anything in his whole life; and he should know since he is already dressed as doctor). Oh, and Cyborg confesses his love to her, which leads to a sweet “booyah” between couples.

Since Vic and Larry are two of the more downer characters on Doom Patrol, this foolish optimism fueled by the Scants is a refreshing breather. This is especially true for Vic. Larry’s arc is often heart wrenching, but meaty, whereas Vic doesn’t typically have as much to do. I have to say, I am like Vic overall more this season.

Kipling also benefits from being a dum-dum. Already a likable smartass, it’s nice to see the drunk wizard taken down a peg. Even he isn’t too smart to avoid getting infected by the Scants, and the Scant Queen prods him about his secret love for Baphomet, the horse-head demon without a body. It makes one almost feel bad for Willoughby, who uses a first edition The Catcher in the Rye for some papercut blood magic to send a message to her.

Rather than the Scantoverse from the comics (created by artists Mike Allred and writer Gerard Way, musician and creator of The Umbrella Academy), the Scants are hanging out in the painting that had trapped Beardhunter and Mr. Nobody. Sporting some Beast Boy Teen Titans Go! undies, Beardhunter mentions Nobody skipped out of the painting for another gig, cheekily referenced in a meta onscreen promo for the animated Harley Quinn series where he plays Joker and Clayface. Along with the Scant Queen’s self-referential magazine, these kinds of jokes work on Doom Patrol because the show has set up the expectation of weirdness, and they allow the viewer to revisit characters like Beardhunter and Nobody (though, for now, in absentia).

But the show also plays with expectations by making Miranda a calming, rational persona as primary. Sure, she seems to be trying hard to be well liked and learn how things are done around Doom Manor because she’s the new kid. Indeed, making breakfast, fawning over Rita as her biggest fan, and offering help from the other alters – not to mention saving the day by killing the Scant Queen – go far in winning the team over. And she appears less chaotic than Jane.

However, Miranda appears to have her own agenda underway in the Underground, and it looks like Jane will be stuck down there investigating. Who will be the one topside to ask for Jane back? Probably Cliff.

That is, unless Cliff isn’t too absorbed with his newly arrived daughter.

In classic Chief fashion, he rocketed Robotman back to Earth (and right through a billboard for the autobiography from the dino-side of Animal-Vegetable-Man, which received accolades from Gerard Way, Doom Patrol writer Jeremy Lambert, and, of course, supervillain Kite Man).

Doom Patrol Season 2: Dorothy Spinner is Forever Young

By Rosie Knight

But it turns out he wasn’t trying to kill him, as it initially appeared at the end of last episode. Cliff has a literal journey walking back to the manor, vowing to kill Niles along the way, getting shat upon by a bird (who he also vows to kill), and subjecting himself to pathetic shout-outs as a talking statue in exchange for cellphone use. But Cliff literally wills himself forward and is eventually rewarded with Clara waiting for him – and holding the missing tape of Niles’ confession of what he did to Cliff. I had a suspicion the Chief was out to betray Cliff again, and it seemed confirmed last week, so this reveal was a welcome surprise. The Chief is no saint, but I want him to ultimately be a good guy, perhaps because I can’t help but love Timothy Dalton’s performance so much.

And it does appear that Dalton will have more to do as Chief coming up. His venture into the Yukon, searching for Slava, instead leads to a vision of Candlemaker who suggests he is a creation of Slava’s ancestors. I don’t know if I buy it; Candlemaker has already proven himself to be a manipulator. But the vision is enough for Niles to call upon Kipling, wherein the episode closes with the two appearing to discuss a plan to dispatch Dorothy because she is too powerful to be contained. It’s a dark episode finale for the remorseful Chief to be pondering killing his beloved daughter.

Finally, Rita had her own parental issues to work through this week. While shadowing the Cloverton beekeeper who she is portraying in the community theater show “Our Town” (but not the Thornton Wilder one), she seeks to find inspiration for her one line: “My Bees!” Rather, she ends up drunk with the beekeeper, talking about how parents are sometimes full of their own ideas in an attempt to protect their (potentially also dumb) kids. Rita may think she has found catharsis by talking to the bees, but something inside her might be fixed after all. She demonstrates control over her powers to thwart a mugging, and potentially becoming a real superhero: The Beekeeper? Does Cloverton have a new avenging angel buzzing about?

OK, a final petty thought that is driving me a little bonkers about a show I think is legitimately great, but Rita seems to have a disappearing parasol at the beginning of the ep when she walks up to the beekeeper’s porch. The sudden vanishing act had me wondering if Mr. Nobody was operating behind the scenes after all.

That said, an episode about our heroes having a lot of dumb ideas ended up being a smart story that allowed the actors to stretch a little and have some out-of-character fun in their roles.

The post Doom Patrol Season 2 Episode 7 Review: Dumb Patrol appeared first on Den of Geek.

from Den of Geek https://ift.tt/2WLhKDl

#aion-rsa #Den of Geek

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insomniac-dot-ink · 5 years

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You’re Not Handling the End of the World Very Well

genre: superheroes, end of the world, wlw

words: 3k

summary: After all of civilization has properly and meaningful collapsed, there are only a handful of meta-humans and villains left on the empty world.

So what happens when the villains win? When the planet has apocalypse-d and it’s all gone to shit? The real question is what do super-villains threaten heroes with now that everything else is gone.

The world’s over. Lucy Goren just wants her damn dog back.

Ko-Fi ⭐Patreon ⭐ WordPress⭐Twitter ⭐ Ao3

story for one of my patrons for ‘Random-Pick-a-Prompt’ event for April!

Lucy’s boots scraped across the chunky rubble on the floor. It echoed low and grating across the empty space, a reminder, no, a very tired and heavy-handed statement.

Lucy looked over the gloomy, remote hallway, cast in long shadows and flickering fluorescent lights overhead. She rolled her eyes gracefully at it. It was an underground government facility that had long since been abandoned, bombed, and then abandoned again. Cracks spread in fine spiderwebs from the concrete ceiling to the wall, with little peak-holes into the dark ethers of the building.

She stepped around the next heap of rubble and made her way toward the nearest fire exit at the end of the hall, technically, she could fly there, but what would be the point?

The exit sign blinked red and cast a fiery neon glow across the grey walls, a splotch of color in the faded dingy surroundings. Water dripped from somewhere far away and stagnant air entombed the hallway.

A speaker crackled to life from a black box in the corner, staticy and jumbled, it had obviously been jerry-rigged together recently compared to every other broken thing in the dilapidated setting.

It started with a laugh. A simmering boundless sound, building and rippling off the walls, echoing down the hall and toward its demise situated directly up it’s own arsehole.

Lucy kept her eyes focused straight ahead and made no move to acknowledge it.

“It’s been too long, Lady Remix.” The voice purred as the laugh died, “I suppose you’re surprised to see me again.” “Yeah,” she responded without venom. “I kinda thought you’d manage to choke on your own spit by this point?” She tipped her chin up, unwashed blonde curls tickling her shoulder tops. “Since it’s so bullshit flavored and all.” The laugh returned, hot and pleased with itself. “My, my,” the voice radiated a perfectly practiced sense of glee. “Someone updated her vocabulary. Tired of being a role model for ungrateful brats, hmm?”

Lucy made a face up at the ceiling, “You’re the only left who thinks I’m a big deal Stephanie.” She said dryly and reached for the exit door, putting her hand on the cold dented handle. “But I’ll kick your ass into next Tuesday to be my own damn role model this time.”

She opened the door and stepped into a drafty stairwell, a damp cold crawled up her spine numbly, it smelled metallic and dusty.

“Lady Remix,” the voice tutted gently, “Your confidence becomes you. But I’m afraid you’re too late.” Lucy grimaced and looked up the endless grey steps both below and above. “You’ll have to go down the rabbit hole to meet your fate, little hero!” She cackled, “And see exactly what your chivalry has brought you.” Lucy simply held up her middle finger to the camera this time. She carefully oriented herself in space, getting a sense of her body, her beating heart, and boxy solid surroundings. She touched off from the ground.

This trick had taken years of training, sweat and tears, to be able to reorient empty space itself and allow her to float.

When Lucy was a teenager she had risked her life in a toxic oil field (as you do) and managed to stop a major spill into a local water supply. She had gotten terribly sick afterward and assumed it was over. However, a mysterious figure arrived and asked if she’d like to change her fate, reorient her dying cells and everything else around them.

She was 17, she completely and totally accepted. She had been gifted the power of Spatial Manipulation, she could reorient anything within seven feet of her. That was a long time ago, it gave her a headache if she thought about it too hard.

It had seemed worth it at the time. Now she just snorted lightly.

She stared up at the speaker in the stairwell, tracing the wires with her eyes: following the cables upward and into the wall. Lucy gave a shallow smile and then threw herself toward the next story, gliding past the gaps in the stairs and doors hanging off of their hinges.

“I said down the rabbit hole, little bunny,” the speaker said tartly. “Down. Stop that.”

Lucy quickly made her way to the second story of the underground facility, confirming her own hunch. A big red door sat with the word ‘Restricted’ painted in bulky white letters across it. The letters looked freshly applied.

“Ugh,” Stephanie did not sound pleased.

Lucy twisted the locked door away, reorienting it in space to gape wide open and reveal a dark, noisy room. The place buzzed with machines and beeping monitors, appearing to be a vast repurposed storage area with only various fuzzy glowing silver screens to give it light.

Wires criss-crossed the floor, sloppily taped down and sprawling out from the center like messy vines. A personal generator hummed in the corner, computers heaped on top of each other in a maze of defunct tech, and one central enormous screen bathed the area in alien wintery light.

Lucy took a breath in through her nose and landed heavily, she let her shadow cut a long and imposing silhouette across the concrete floors, backlit by the stairwell lights. The inside smelled musty, warm, and like corn chips that had gone incredibly stale.

A giant chair faced away her, high-backed and on a set of little rolling wheels, it was positioned directly in front of the main staticked screen. Lucy didn’t bother to inspect anything and simply strode in, letting her voice fill the room. “Where is my damn dog?” She growled. “Mmm,” Stephanie’s voice was low and rumbling, the door slammed loudly shut behind Lucy. “Have you finally learned the lesson?” Lucy groaned, “Oh my God.” “After all this time,” the other woman turned slowly, painfully slowly, her face caught half in the shadows and half light of the screen. “Have you finally learned the price of loving?” Lucy made a face, blinked several times, and then turned around in a tight circle. “Kitt!” Lucy called loudly, picking her way across the floor. “Kitt, come here girl!”

“Your precious pup is-” “Shut up, Steph.” She said dryly, “Literally nothing is stopping me from re-orienting your heart outside of your damn body.”

Stephanie paused for a moment, obviously startled, her mouth pinched shut and twisted off to the side. Lucy crossed the room to a darker corner, an area evidently lived in: strewn with clutters of trash, a mini-fridge, raggedy sweatpants, and a mattress all shoved to the side.

Lucy looked back to Stephanie mildly.

“Haven’t you heard?” Stephanie puffed herself up, recovering neatly, she tossed her head back with a flare. “There’s nothing for you to orient, hero... I never had a heart to begin with!” “Oh my God,” Lucy massaged the bridge of her nose. “Are we doing this? Are we still doing this?” “Oh precious, ignorant Remix,” she simpered, purple lipstick catching the light in an easy smirk. “Pure, brilliant power will never stop. It never rests for the foolish heroes of the world! Those easily worn down and broken. I am endless.” “Have you been just,” Lucy glanced at the pile of trash in the corner, “holed up in this shithole this whole time? Stephanie,”

“For I am!” She continued blithely.

“That mattress has mold on it.” “THE HEGEMON.” Lucy gave her a completely toneless look, twitching and unamused. “Are you done?” She looked her up and down. “Because I am.” “I don’t know the meaning of ‘done’! I am The Hegemon and you will know LOSS and GUILT, those things subjected to me at a young age, a blessing of pain that gave me insights into human nature itse-” “First of all, last time I checked your name was Stephanie Brewster and you worked in accounting for seven years.” Stephanie frowned dourly at that. “And I don’t care.”

Stephanie’s nostrils flared. She was a wry, bony woman with short, wild black hair that stood up like a faux-mohawk with too much product. She had a pair of purple goggles covering eyes and patented dark shiny lipstick. A black lab coat was buttoned all the way up to her throat and tall shiny black boots clad her calves.

Her usually purple nails were chipped and bitten down to their very nubs, she looked softly more restless than usual, shifting in place and drumming her nails on the arm of the chair endlessly.

“God this place smells awful,” Lucy kicked an empty tv dinner tray. “Steph, this is so bad.”

Stephanie sniffed loudly, petulance entering her tone. “Well you aren’t looking so great either.” That was a fair statement. Lucy hadn’t showered in an uncountable number of days, her dirty blonde curls much dirtier than usual and slouchy jeans ripped around the cuffs. She wore a dingy pink night shirt, beaten up gym shoes, and a lumpy sports bra from an unknown era.

Obviously, her face was maskless and when she caught her reflection in the dead tv screens she looked back at her own bloodshot, baggy eyes. Her skin looked slightly sickly and too pale, she had even lost some of her iconic round hips and full figure.

People magazine called her an ‘Icon of Plus-Sized Girls Everywhere,’ but that was by Hollywood standards and her thighs had been mostly muscle back then. That was all a lifetime ago.

“Kitt!” She cupped her mouth and called, “Come here girl, let’s go home.”

“Isn’t it obvious?” Stephanie wheeled her chair around, trying to keep Lucy’s attention. “She’s not coming.” Lucy turned slowly, thoughtfully. She put her hands on her hips, “How attached are you to your teeth Steph? 32 always seemed excessive to me. But we could discuss.”

Stephanie pulled back in her chair, expression tensing. “You’re being kind of an asshole right now.” It was almost a whisper.

Lucy rolled her eyes, “Yeah, well, the world ended and you stole my dog.” She stomped her way over toward the villain, “Only one of those things I can change.”

Stephanie looked away, tone shifting from it’s usual mocking drawl. “Oh, it’s not that bad.” She frowned deeply, “Minnesota is still fine.” “Ugh,” she groaned loudly, “Pestilence got them last month. You’ve really been here this whole time, huh?” She wrinkled her nose at several packs of energy drinks stacked in the corner.

Stephanie got to her feet, unfolding her body like a lithe house cat stretching out, she tilted her head to the side. “I took shelter.” She said aggressively, “It’s what Gentlemen Damnation said to do for us Chosen.”

“Do we really have to call him that?” Lucy did another aimless turn in place. “Like, I know he painted it in blood on all major monuments. But considering those were destroyed too maybe we can stop?”

Stephanie crossed her arms over her chest. “He is the new and eternal lord of Lamb’s Blood New Earth. What else would we call him?” Lucy scratched her chin, “I’m thinking ‘Gunk I Find in between my Toes During the Summer’.” “Well, I mean-” “Burst Pustules on the Buttocks of Men in Unwashed Saunas.” “That’s kind of a mouthful.” “Ratty McRatman, the Sequel. Baby Whose Birth Certificate is an Apology Letter from Trojan. A Barnacle on the Ballsack of-” “Yes, I get it,” Stephanie reached for some sort of electric staff, “How long have you been saving those up?” She shrugged listlessly, “When is the last time I saw your face?” “Haha,” she turned around, “If I had known your banter had become so… unpolished. Well.” Lucy took a couple threatening steps toward her, “Enough.” She moved her hands quickly, “It’s almost Kitt’s dinner time and I just found a DVD copy of Space Jam buried last night. I have shit to do.” Stephanie cleared her throat, “I see you’re impatient for my hand to be played.” She tried to plaster on a new taunting smile, “I have a series of challenges even you will lose heart at! The grit of heroes tested by my might and ingenuity, tested- only to find themselves,” she licked her lips, “Lacking.” Lucy narrowed her eyes, and then took a sudden step toward her, bringing Stephanie into her zone of manipulation. She re-oriented the other woman upside down in space, Stephanie flailed for a moment, reaching for her weapon.

Lucy quickly re-oriented anything in her pockets and staff to the other side of her. “On a scale of one to ten, how fond of breathing are you?”

Her eyes went wide, “What?”

She separated the villain’s air supply from her lungs.

Stephanie’s face went two shades paler and she started clawing at her throat and kicking in space, arms pinwheeling and trying to right herself and gasp for air. Lucy’s eyes just narrowed further. “Now.” She growled. “Where is my dog?”

Stephanie kicked and spittle dripped down the side of her mouth, she gaped for another couple of strained seconds. Finally, she pointed toward the space under her enormous office desk off to the side. Lucy let her fall unceremoniously to the floor and made a beeline toward the desk.

She knelt down quickly and caught sight of a wire cage pushed into the corner. She pulled the thing toward her and exhaled. A lumpy form lay on top of a thin blue blanket, the chest of her floppy brown beagle rose and fell gently inside.

She managed a smile and unlatched the cage, reaching in to pet the dog’s side and scratch her behind the ears. Kitt didn’t stir, but Lucy knew it was only a heavy sedative.

She carefully gathered her dog into her arms and turned around.

Stephanie was sprawled on the floor, gasping for air and clutching at her chest. “That was,” she rasped and unsteadily sat up. “Completely against The Code.” “Don’t you get it?” Lucy strode over, reaching the scientist and taking her purple goggles in hand, she tore them off her head. “The Code is gone. The hero society is collapsed. Everybody’s off planet or dead,” she bore her teeth. “You won.” Stephanie’s eyes were an animated misty grey and flicked all around the room until they landed on her own empty open palms. “Yes. Gentlemen Damnat- David.” She said softly, “he said we’d win.” “Yeah,” Lucy jerked her head up to the ceiling, holding her dog close. “Woopee. He got what he wanted. Society’s over and villain’s are stealing my damn dog.” She looked down again sharply, “She’s just a dog Steph!” Stephanie’s chin dimpled delicately, “I wasn’t going to hurt her.” She looked away. “This isn’t how you play.” “I know.” The weight, the heaving immeasurable weight, settled on her shoulder tops. Lucy fell to her knees and sat dully on the floor next to her. “The rules are gone. It’s over… you all got what you wanted.” Stephanie scratched the back of her neck, “I don’t think everyone was supposed to… go.” She said quietly, “Just the foolish and soft-hearted and those who toted light and selfishlessness above the-” “Yeah, yeah,” Lucy put her hand up, “Have fun reveling in your victory. Imma go watch Space Jam with my dog.” Lucy got up to leave, knees creaking and a warm body limp in her arms. Her thoughts drifted over to the task of flying all the way home from here, even in its death throes D.C. was a nightmare to navigate.

“Wait,” Stephanie called weakly, “Lady Remix.” She carefully addressed her, “It wasn’t my plan to create The Four Horsemen. I didn’t know…” “Duh,” Lucy shook her head, “You were like, a C villain at best hun.” Stephanie wrinkled her nose, “Can’t you call me Hegemon once? For old times sake?” “No,” she said flatly, “You can call me Lucy though.” Stephanie balked, “Absolutely not,” she scrambled back, “terrible.” It was Lucy’s turn to laugh, “God. You’re so old school.”

Stephanie slowly crawled to her feet again, much less nimble and calculating than before. “Yes.” She said slowly. “It’s not as if David gave us much of a choice on how to rebuild the world,” she looked toward the dark corners, the outside. “Not even an email.” Lucy shrugged, “He took out a lot of villains too I heard,” she said offhandedly, “Everybody. And anyone who made it out just left the planet.” Stephanie considered her for a long moment, “Not you?”

She looked back to the door, “Not me.” She sighed, “duty and all that I thought.” She scowled at the door handle, “Plus… not everyone deserves off-planet.” Stephanie burst out into a dark laugh, voice resonating to it’s rough purr. “Deserve? What hero language! An arrogant mechanism of the weak to justify their own actions.” “Seriously?” “Right. Sorry.” Stephanie took a couple hurried steps toward her, hair askew and bright grey eyes surveying the area. “So, where are you now in the fight?” Lucy took a step back, “Nowhere. You can tell your master I’ve thrown in the towel,” her eyes unfocused, “there’s no one left to save.” Stephanie opened her mouth, and then closed it. She looked down at the floor unhappily, “There’s your dog.” She said in a controlled tone, “And you.” Lucy shot her a tense look, “Goodbye Stephanie.” She adjusted Kitt in her arms to reach for the door. “If you bother me again I will be more off Code than you know.” She didn’t stop her as Lucy shouldered the door open and started climbing the last of the stairs back outside. She was halfway toward the faceless metal exit door when she heard a number of hurried steps chasing after her.

Lucy stopped in place but didn’t turn.

“He really ruined it you know.” She started babbling, “He really missed the point we were all trying to drive home.” Lucy sprouted a lopsided smile and glanced over her shoulder, “What are you trying to say?” Stephanie drew herself up, “I may have been a C villain but even I know this isn’t how it was supposed to go, and I should,” she licked her lips, floundering slightly. She hunched her shoulders, “and what kind of woman of action would be if I didn’t do something?” Lucy threw her head back and laughed, it was filled with all that suffocating weight of the ages, “Are you going to be a hero now?” Stephanie put her hands on her hips, “Absolutely not!” She looked away petulantly, “hero? God no.” Her gaze followed her upwards, back to the door. “Are you?” “I don’t think so.” She reached for the door and it swung open, pouring in the ashen light of the storm clouds and empty roads. “Want to come?”

She blinked a couple times, frowned, and then nodded stiltedly.

They walked out into the broken world together.

#wlw #sapphic #short story #superheores #original story #f/f #my work #dark comedy

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lemongogo · 5 years

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based on the way things are now, his relationship with dabi and the LOV/meta whatever, his position as the #2 hero and double agent for the commission, what do you think will be the most likely/realistic thing that'll happen to hawks in the future chapters?

o man im super bad at gauging where a plot-line is realistically headed because i have a bad habit of misinterpreting a lot of the content BUT i dont think it looks too good on either side

in the latest few chapters, hawks understood the urgency needed to inform the hero commission about the progression of the lov. it sounds like they already have a good idea of what happened (given their vague statements about deika city), but not to the extent that he does. he mentioned telling endea/vor but i dont think?? endvr was in on the double agent thing? (hence the whole surprise nomu incident) so i dont know if him going to the number 1 is going to affect his mission in either which way. but i definitely feel like the upcoming internship with class a’s big 3 is going to be a heavy plot point. hawks having murdered jeanist (bakugou’s involvement), hawks’ involvement with dabi and the potential for the touya reveal (endevvr and todoroki involvement) and hawks’ double agent bullshit with shigaraki and all for one (midoriya involvement). it feels like this is the calm before the storm and all hell is abt to break loose (especially with horikoshi’s statement about the manga getting darker / having more reveals, etc).

i think the only thing im pretty certain of is that he’s going to be the commission’s scapegoat for jeanist’s murder* (i srsly just think its a body double / clone) so that he can get full participation with the league. they already know that he doesnt care about publicity, rank, etc. so i think they’re going to take advantage of that and its gonna oof ouch hurt a bit. drag his name through the mud, blame him for x and y, make him a controversial public figurehead, and then send him out to finish his mission

but then AgAIN dabi is already suspicious of hawks and i wouldn’t put it past shigaraki and co. to know that something is up. so of course, you have the possibility of them sniffing him out. i’ve heard theories about hawks being used as a high end nomu (??) but i think thats pretty unrealistic && ill eat my words if it actually happens. i also dont think they’ll kill him, either, but im sure they arent going to let him go easy if they understand the extent to which he’s working w the commission :/

so i cant really say AAKJDFH . i honestly dont know who’s going to get to him first. the commission sees him as a sacrifice for the greater good, but the lov/plf also wont tolerate any double agent narrative. personally?? i want some fun chaotic neutral hawks in which his morals are blurred and sets up a divide between true “good and evil” but in reality he’s probably going to be pro until the end, in which he’s more or less alienated from both sides and kinda left working w the commission from underground or something idk

what about you ? i wanna hear what you think is gonna happen :3c

#im SORRY this is probably way off and ooc for him LMAO #this is why i only draw & dont write AA #hawks #bnha #bnha spoilers #Anonymous #asktag

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justadram · 5 years

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Meta Monday: Dragons

“Dragons are fire made flesh, and fire is power.”--Quaithe to Daenerys in A Clash of Kings

In honor of all things ghastly, this week we’re talking about the fantasy genre beast to end all beasts, the dragon, and examining its role in ASOIAF and medieval history. Good or bad, it’s not entirely clear yet the role dragons will play in Westeros, but one thing is for certain: they feature heavily in modern fantasy and have been the stuff of nightmares for centuries.

Indeed, the presence of dragons in modern fantasy is one of the biggest holdovers from the medieval imagination. Medievals loved a damn dragon tale. You could talk dragons with just about anyone in Western Europe, and they’d know what you were yammering on about. What a dragon looked like, however, differed from place to place. Some of them were snake like creatures that slithered and killed via constriction, some had limbs and wings, some spewed venom, others fire. The Beowulf dragon, for example, is serpent like. The Norse Fáfnir is a slithering, venomous serpent too. While Chrétien de Troyes’ Yvain slays a fire-breathing dragon.

The main types of dragons were the Continental dragon or fire-breathing dragon we all know that inspires modern fantasy writers, the mostly wingless Lindworm of Germanic tradition, the limbless and wingless Germanic sea serpent, and the two-legged and winged wyvrn.

A variety of dragon-like creatures can be found in ASOIAF as well. The wyvern is a dragonish beast from Sothoryos that doesn’t breathe fire, but is still one of the reasons that continent is sparsely populated. The firewyrm, on the other hand, is a wingless fire-breathing underground creature, which tunnels through earth and stone. Additionally, there are two legendary species: sea dragons and ice dragons. The former might still be found in the Sunset Sea; the latter in the Shivering Sea and White Waste.

The ice pressed close around them, and he could feel the cold seeping into his bones, the weight of the Wall above his head. It felt like walking down the gullet of an ice dragon.--Jon Snow, A Storm of Swords.

Depictions of scales, four legs, wings, and fire breathing are the norm in modern fantasy. GRRM’s dragons differ in one key area: they have two legs and use their wings in the same way a bat does--both to fly and as forelegs. Another agreed upon detail from the past and our present is dragon size: they end up big, but they start out small. Daenerys’ dragons start out the size of cats and firewyrm brood are the size of a human arm. Likewise, the dragons in Ragnars saga loðbrókar (hello, Vikings fans) start out small enough to be put in a jar. All end up large enough to do major damage. Many modern fantasy and medieval dragons are also treasure hoarders, who prefer to live underground in caves, a predilection not shared by ASOIAF dragons, who require open spaces to grow and aren’t greedy for anything but food seemingly.

Medieval dragons were also fantastical in that they happened to other people, often far away and in the distant past. Christendom tended to think of dragon-slaying as happening in the distant east. St Elizabeth the Wonderworker slayed a dragon by stomping it to death in Constantinople in the 6th c.; St Margaret was eaten by a dragon in Antioch and burst from its stomach by God’s grace, killing it in 303; St Theodore killed a dragon in Asia Minor before 306; St George slew his famous dragon in Cappadocia or Libya before 303. Many of these accounts were popularized in the west in the 11th and 12th centuries, the same time as Chrétien de Troyes was popularizing the knight errant, who sometimes slew dragons. These saintly dragon-slayings supposedly happened in the east, because the east was viewed as pagan and dragons were stand-ins for the devil.

Although dragons are presently in Westeros on HBO and soon on their way in the books, they similarly originated elsewhere, far away, long ago. There are competing claims as to the origin of dragons in the world. Valyrians claim they spawned from the volcanoes on the Valyrian peninsula. In Assai, they say ancient people tamed dragons and brought them to Valyria. They also might be from the Shadow Lands. Or Valyrian bloodmages could have created dragons from wyverns.

We shall not pretend to any understanding of the bond between dragon and dragonrider; wiser heads have pondered that mystery for centuries. We do know however, that dragons are not horses, to be ridden by any man who throws a saddle on their back.--The Princess and the Queen, GRRM

The Targaryens, who originally hail from Valyria, are dragon-riders. So, while many people rightfully fear dragons, Targaryen power is built upon the relationship between rider and dragon. There is a positive relationship between the beast and rider. Dragon riding is modern fantasy fare--but not all medieval dragons were considered purely evil. Most famously, the Welsh are represented in their mythology by the red dragon, who will ultimately defeat the Anglo-Saxons or white dragon: not an evil portend, but one of future victory.

Some were also not so far away. In England, dragons happened closer to home with some regularity. Anglo-Saxons settled Knotlow (now in Derbyshire) in 700 and called the hill there Wormhill, the lair of a dragon. The Bisterne Dragon of Hampshire was dispatched by a Sir Maurice Berkeley in the 15th c., saving the village from its milk thieving ways. Celtic legend surrounds Bignor Hill in Sussex. The Lambton Worm in Durham was dispatched by John Lambton upon his return from the crusades. A similar legend exists of the Linton Worm, along the Scottish borders. Etc, etc.

Elsewhere, they also could make trouble closer to home, often during the period of conversion from Germanic paganism to Christianity. St Clement of Metz tamed the Graoully, a foul dragon, in return for the local population’s conversion. St Olaf killed a sea serpent in Valldal, Norway by chucking it into the mountains. Umbria had a few troublesome dragons, including a wyvern in Terni and a dragon in Fornole, respectively dispatched by a knight and a pope. Holy men and women often feature as dragon-slayers, since dragons became symbols of Satan after the Christianization of Europe.

Dragons were by and large something to be dispatched, defeated by the hero either in pagan or Christian tradition. And while Daenerys looks upon her dragons as children, even she has trouble controlling Drogon and locks the other two up, when a man claims Drogon ate his daughter. Not everyone looks kindly upon them: they are to be an instrument of conquest, as they were in the Wars of Conquest against the Seven Kingdoms. To those about to be conquered, they are feared, as much as they were feared as Satanic symbols.

However, for all the long history of dragons being better off dead, they are also creatures steeped in surprising magic. For example, in Germanic tradition, Siegfried is gifted with invulnerable skin after he kills and is bathed in the blood of a dragon. Their magic can be expansive.

This is no doubt true in Westeros as well. We are told that when dragons went extinct in the world of ASOIAF, the winters became longer and the summers shorter. Their magic is tied to the seasons, tied to the very thing which now threatens Westeros, as surely as their flames do. And they may play a key role not in the subjugation of Westeros to Targaryen rule, but in the fight for Westeros, as they face the undead army that approaches from beyond the Wall.

“Necromancy animates these wights, yet they are still only dead flesh. Steel and fire will serve for them. The ones you call the Others are something more.”--Melisandre, A Storm of Swords.

After all, dragonglass, which the smallfolk say is made by dragons, is one of the few things that can kill an Other. The other is dragonsteel, which Jon and Sam believe is Valyrian steel, the outcome of a lost process of forging with magical properties, possibly forged by dragon. All things dragon seem to point to the possible defeat of the Others, which means we might want to keep those dragons around just a little bit longer.

*Meta Monday appears on Mondays when I’m feeling inspired. Feel free to follow me or the tracked tag: Meta Monday.

**If you have a topic you’d like to see addressed by a medievalist, please send me an ask. Past topics are here.

#got meta #asoiaf meta #daenerys targaryen #dragons #medieval history #meta monday

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gofancyninjaworld · 3 years

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OPM Manga Chapter 143 Review: How to Behave

The day after April Fools’ Day, Murata has graced us with another chapter. A short one, but a spicy one to be sure!

Story

We start exactly where we left off. Genos comes crashing down to earth, in a very not badass way this time. He doesn’t look well at all with energy sparking uncontrolled from every joint. Bang, Bomb, Fubuki and Puri Puri Prisoner approach him with concern, asking if there’s anything to be done for him. To Puri Puri’s suggestion that Drive Knight might be able to help, Genos says that the latter has already left.

Drive Knight has never represented himself as anything as a person focussed on achieving his goals and exploiting whatever can be exploited. So it’s no surprise that he drops Genos unceremoniously once the barrier is down and he can escape, just a bit disappointing. It’s however more than a little disturbing that he dropped Genos into the midst of the other heroes like a primed grenade. Not nice. Not nice at all.

Puri Puri gets a distress call from underground. It’s coming from Child Emperor (yaaay, he lives! We knew he would). He dives into the ground to go retrieve the boy, both for his own sake and to try getting Genos some help. Just how not nice Drive Knight’s little gift was comes when Genos tells the others to stop wasting time and get at least five kilometers away if they wanted to live. Given that it was futile, he’d be taking the monsters out when his core exploded. Pause to think about that for a moment -- that’s a radius of total destruction that’s five kilometers wide, leaving aside the more widespread destruction and blinding is totally terrifying. He’d do a lot more than take out the monsters, but pretty much everyone we’ve seen on scene above ground.

It is in this context that Fubuki steps up to him. Genos starts to try to run her off saying that even if she isn’t the strongest, she shouldn’t go to waste.

“Be quiet,” she says in a tone that brooks no dissent.

And to his astonishment, Genos is quiet.

I CLAPPED. That was excellent indeed. Fubuki has most emphatically taken charge of the situation.

Even more excellent, she starts to tell him off as she lays hands on him, mirroring his harsh words to himself (good!). Despite the strain, she sees her role as a leader and as a leader, she’s determined not to abandon anyone. Because psychics are a bit magic in this world, she’s able to cool the reactor to the point where its cooling functions are able to kick back in and put the core back under control. She also extends her healing touch to the organic side of him, which we’ve seen her do for others already.

Whew... crisis averted.

And then she starts to cough up blood and collapses right before the horrified gazes of the others.

Would now be a good time to mention that the cadre are still closing in?

Meta

I think I’m going to start with just one image and go outwards from there. The sight of Genos reaching out for Fubuki as she collapses is touching, but then I thought about it a lot more and then I realised there’s more to it than the surprise, concern and regret that Genos is undoubtedly feeling.

To be around Genos is to be drafted into his guardian angel squad. This isn’t the first time someone has saved him. But this *is* the first time that anyone has sacrificed themselves for him. He’s the one who is always looking to take the worst of the blow, who this chapter was ready to leverage his death to get rid of the monsters and now, someone has been willing to suffer for him. Someone has literally shed their blood for him. (and I wonder if Murata had a sneaky little look at the calendar when deciding to release this little chapter).

The astonishment in his eyes tells me that this hits deep with Genos. We’ll have to see where it takes him, but this is opening up another paragraph or three in his character’s story.

Not that Fubuki is dead. As they cradle her, Bang remarks with wonder ‘she has the makings of a great leader.’ I have been following Fubuki, as I’ve been following other characters around. Notwithstanding her strong arm techniques with Saitama, it’s been clear for a long time that she had genuine rapport with and attracted the loyalty of her group. They bought into her vision, they cared about her and they’ve been proud to wear the trademark black blazers of the Blizzard Group. The big thing for her was being whipped by Do-S and finding that Saitama’s words about her using her group as a front to feel good about herself... then coming back two days later with the determination to change things.

She still sees herself as the leader of her unwitting new group, but this arc has demanded that she show decisiveness and act on behalf of them rather than using them as her shield. She’s come far already. I’m keen to see how much further she can go!

Let me add that I am glad ONE is continuing to build on his policy of having female characters be effective ones in their own right who continue to have their own story to develop. Even if Murata does have a fatal attraction to boobs...

Btw, Dr Kuseno, don’t give Genos that kind of juice again. Not anytime soon. His determination to kill monsters at any cost is indication that he’s still not mature enough to handle great power.

#OPM #meta #review #Genos #Fubuki #Bang #Bomb #Puri Puri Prisoner #Child Emperor #Drive Knight #So great to see Fubuki really stepping up #more and more she's beginning to play the part of a leader rather than play-acting one

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roxannepolice · 6 years

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Your character analysis for IX makes so much sense that I’m nervous and feel like I’m indulging reylo too much. I’m losing confidence in their relationship ending unambiguously. It seems like her arc is going to be very separate from his.

Ok, so… I’m actually surprised? What I wrote boils down to Star Wars are gonna go big or go home and we came to a point where it can be interpreted as they gonna go small, chaste and proper?

Sis/bro in waiting, don’t worry they gonna go BIG! All of my disagreements with usually accepted reylo predictions boil down to how they gonna get triple wedding with Finnrose and Poe tearfully giving BB-8 as a bashful bride to BB-9e instead of faking their deaths, living in an exile or waiting for prison sentence to finish! Because those endings? They aren’t likely to happen, just as Kylo Ben isn’t getting an individual redemption and Rey isn’t a static character.

The fact that the fandom or actually entire audience is so freaking keen on making Rey a static beacon of light is what probably baffles me most. Because tbph, if Rey is the character we’re repeatedly told in a way forbidding any questions that she is, then she is a pretty boring character, not because of being “overpowered” but because of having no serious moral struggles (we’ve seen her faced with temptations - but not dilemmas). Audience is sexists as hell is questioning her skills and what is also sexist is lack of proper female villains in the main SW movies but I think what people don’t want to put their finger on is that Star Wars have never given us characters who simply are good, always, regardless of their backgrounds and circumstances - on the contrary, they’re very keen to show how nurture affects the grown up character, I would actually say it’s one of the features that makes this fairy tale stand out, the characters seeming just good or just evil being fairly well up in their years. Rey stayed good in a harsh life of a scavenger on Jakku? Wheeeelp, Anakin also stayed good in a harsh life of a slave on Tattooine - it’s transition to the comfortably poisoning life of a jedi knight on Couruscant that lead him to become Darth Vader. Obi-Wan was a paragon of jedi training gone right, Padmé had a loving nurturing family, same for Luke and Leia regardless of whether they were farmers on a desert or royals on Alderaan, Han’s lack of family shows - as do the strong primal social groups of corellian underground he lived in, Finn formed relationships as positive as one can have in a totalitarian military organisation and Kylo Ben needed to be groomed for two freaking decades before his messed up but loving background gave in.

So no, I’m not buying Rey being an infallible maiden of light that also happens to be a master psychologist Padmé and Obi-Wan weren’t (you know while I totally agree there’s much symbolism to her being a scavenger, can we all agree human psyche is a teensy bit more complicated than starships?). Nope. I actually have this pet theory - while it seems pretty clear that Kylo Ben’s story is what Darth Anakin’s would have been if we were watching OT knowing PT, could it also be that in Rey we’re getting a surprise dessert of near-repetition of Anakin’s fall without anticipating the fall? I really think she could turn out to be a character tailored to make the audience feel the same near-blind hope that Qui-Gon and Obi-Wan had for Anakin and OTrio had for Ben. A near-blind hope that instead of helping fulfill that hope made them destructively pose for someone they weren’t.

light side my ass

But that’s exactly why this effed up yin yang will come together. I think that while everyone keeps pointing out yin yang symbolism in reylo, fewer reflect on its actual implications - black dot, white dot and the fact that yin and yang change places the moment you spin the disk. Which brings me to another point I’m in disagreement with majority of reylo meta writers: I really don’t think you’ll turn-you’ll be the one to turn implies they’ve seen the same vision of mutual hae. Their body language is too anguished/defensive for that. Basically, a you misinterpreted-no, you misinterpreted situation is too obvious for neither of them to think of it - if they have seen a mutual hae. And since databank confirmed they have both seen some future and Rey speaks of a solid and clear vision which dismisses the possibility of them seeing an abstract act of turning as one youtuber tried to interpret, we’re left with either deconstruction trope (f*ck prophecy, to quote Jaime) or them having seen the other one acting in a way implying allegiance to the side they currently don’t belong to. And since TLJ made their political stance pretty clear…

The thing is, the last act of TLJ saw both Rey and Ben having their sand castles destroyed - for Rey it was admittance of denial (denial, not hope, I don’t care how much material will insist on calling it hope) she’s lived in for some 15 years that did nontheless keep the darkness in her controlled, for Ben it was Luke’s sacrifice blowing another huge hole (next to the one Han’s sacrifice created) in the sand castle of lies Snoke built around him to keep the light away. And neither of those idiots acknowledges the implications. Also, may I strip away the surface of but he’s in charge of a dark side organisation and she’s the hero of a light side organisation! and rephrase it into he’s responsible for loads of people he holds no grudge against and she’s a highly pressurised member of a minor but desperate paramilitary organisation.

The bottom line is, if my predictions/analyses can make one pessimistic, consider that I try to take as little for granted about those movies as I can, assuming practically only some happy ending, consitency of general messages (is bendemption obligatory? no. but if we held Anakin to the same standards, then he didn’t get redeemed either. and considering that Lucas actually stated somewhere that the idea is that he got redeemed through his children then I say his children f*cked up allowing Anakin’s shadow to be used against his grandson - thus, it depends on Ben getting a hae to complete Anakin’s redemption and actually make the central message of the saga real I will finish what you started indeed) and psychoanalitical symbolism (like really, whenever you doubt hae as hell reylo just read Jung; I also recommend Mozart’s Magic Flute which is swarming with conscious/unconscious, light/dark, male/female symbols and guess what there’s actually an adaptation that, albeit tounge-in-cheek employs Star Wars esthetic). And I still arrive at the same basic conclusions as the writers with more optimistic, sure and static premises. So if I say we’re gonna get an angsty af life-and-death reylo duel where she actually kills him with his silent consent then I also mean gurl gonna channel all her love/light and pain/dark combined into healing him and then while the dark princeling tries to come up with a spontaneous thanksgiving paslm, the scavenger princess gonna grab his shirt and suck those plump lips till they both run out of breath. And porgs will be throwing flowers at them.

#reylo #asks #episode ix speculation

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readbythestarlight · 6 years

Text

c2e28

“This flask is Taliesin’s new character” shut up Sam don’t mock us

They’re FINALLY going to go check out the Taskers and i swear if Taliesin’s character isn’t with them I’m gonna die

(unless this is all a trick and Taliesin is just hanging out until Molly can reasonably be brought back…)

Caleb stepping in and doing some strategizing both makes me proud and makes me sad because I guarantee he was great at that before Everything happened

Beau and Caleb disagreeing over a spider

“Shady Debaters Debate Team” I would wear that shirt

Nila wants to use her lighting let her fuck people up with her lightning draw people outside for her to fry please

Yes please get yourself some goddamn healing potions

YAAAAS NILA HAS HEALING WORDS

and good berries xD

GUYS I STILL LOVE HER SO MUCH I WOULD STILL DIE FOR HER

The Bone Orchard…ooooooo

Necromancers maybe?

Please go to the Taskers first I feel like Taliesin has to be with them

If people have been torturning Jester I’m gonna cry she’s too sweet for this

Nila’s smell bag is so cute y’all stop teasing her

“You are relying on me, I’m very happy” sHE’S SO PURE

Oh shiiiiit she just saved them from freaky forest ground monsters that’s my girl!

GRAVE SITE I’M TELLING YA ITS NECROMANCERS

Caleb getting tired of the debate and just heading over the gate

Not just carelessly flinging herself after him smh

Spooooooky place I don’t know how I feel about this

YAAAAAAAAS THEY FOUND HIM HOLY SHIT AHHHHHHHHHHHH OF COURSE HE LIVES IN A GODDAMN GRAVEYARD I SHOULD HAVE KNOWN HE IS THE ULTIMATE GOTH

HE’S A FIRBOLG???

“Caduceus Clay” AND HES A CLERIC GOD BLESS Jester will be delighted that she doesn’t have to do all the healing anymore

Caduceus seems delightful I’m delighted I MISSED YOU TALIESIN

fuck i love him already

he’s like the goddamn grave keeper TALIESIN COULD YOU HAVE GONE ANY MORE GOTH

B: “You’re drinking dead-people tea?”

Cad: “Aren’t we all?”

THE. ULTIMATE. GOTH.

…can’t bring Molly back. I’m not surprised at all given that it would be weird to bring his own character back, but still. That’s okay. It’s fine.

He just figured he’d sit there with his tea until someone came to help him leave lol

C: “Welcome to the Mighty Nein”

Cad: “There’s only, uh—“

B: “DON’T overthink it”

Nott shooting Beau to test Cad’s healing xD

FRUMPKIN NO DONT KILL HIM

fuuuuuuuck he dead

they needed him god dammit

HE’S ALIVE

ALIVE BY 1

I can’t decide if this is going to be a disaster, them going after them again right now, or???

LETS NOT SPLIT UP AT ALL EVEN JUST TO KILL TWO GUARDS

Taking off her armor is a horrible idea guys

Guest!Ashley has the cutest face and the purest laugh??? I love her

While we’re on break I’m trying to decide, is it weird that Taliesin chose to play a cleric when they already have a cleric? Part of me is like “what if he did that because he knew they were gonna need the temporary heals and he’s just gonna stick around as Cad until Jester is back and then he’s gonna rez Molly” and part of me is just like bfs girl Molly is gone let him go??

I don’t think I’ll be able to move on from Molly for sure though until the M9 move on from Shady Creek, with Cad tagging along.

Frumpkin the 3-HP spider

Not asking Cad questions nervously is adorable

Beau just sticking her face in the bag for the luck orb xD

Caleb: talks about breaking a guy’s skull

Nila: “excellent”

Poor Taliesin having to figure out a whole new character. He’d barely really figured out Molly yet.

20 for a perception check nice job Keg!

Sumalee accidentally meta gaming is honestly just cute enough that i don’t even care she could metagame all day and i’d be fine with it

HERE THEY GOOOOO

Matt looks so lost xD

FUCK ‘EM UUUUUUP TEAM BEAU/CALEB/NILA

FUCK ‘EM UUUUUUP TEAM KEG/NOTT/CAD

good rolls, good rolls…

YAAAAS GO KEG!

YAAAAAS NILA BASH HIM DO IT GIRL she’s been waiting to kill someone for so long

goddamn they handled that SO WELL LOOK AT THEM IM SO PROUD

“one was just enjoying the wind, and then darkness forever” Matt xD

Goddamn I can’t believe they pulled that off so well. Lorenzo better watch the fuck out.

Are we calling him Clay then because I liked Cad

Frumkpin the flying spider?? Methinks they all forgot Caleb made him a spider

Nila’s so excited to have like 32 gold she’s so cute you guys

Keg get another nat20 for stealth

okay… are they really unnoticed I’m nervous

B: “Look at the—look at the windows, too.”

Cad: “They’re nice.”

I love hiiiiiim

We can’t go get friends tho because they’re not HERE YET

Boy I can’t wait to see this map

Liam missing his rogue days hardcore right now lol

YAAAAS Taliesin with the nat20 deception I was so scared

“I’m gonna have an ulcer after this game” fucking SAME

Ashley and Sam holding hands like SAME god the stress

Also heck yeah we’re uncovering the maaaaap!

Liam is just very thoroughly uncovering the map

fuck don’t squish Frumpkin

“Hey Phil come help me kill this spider!”

Oh thank god good job poofing him out Caleb

I’m serous guys I love Caleb coming up with plans and leading the group in Fjord’s absence I love it

WAIT

YOU CANT SEND NOTT IN BY HERSELF

DONT DO THAT

FUCK

WE CANT AFFORD TO LOSE ANOTHER MEMBER OF THE GANG GUYS

NOT NOTT

Hey Caleb can you teach Nott the door unlocking spell?

Keg: “Nott. Be careful.”

Nott: “…Do you care about me?”

K: “…Yeah.”

N: *happy wiggle*

Fuck I don’t like this they were doing so well but this is going to be a disaster

A NAT1

FUUUUUUUUUCK

KILL THEM

fuck it was going so well god DAMMIT Caleb this was a BAD PLAN

God they’re not even all together I am literally so afraid right now

Yessss hasted Keg

fuckfuckfuck im literally so fucking scared right now

okay good they missed Not

FUCK ‘EM UP NILA

NO SAVE THE TOTEM FOR LORENZO

SAVE IT NILA

SAVE IT

poison spray yesss that sounds nice and 12pts damage good girl

poor Sam has such a hard time with his rogue skills

NOTT STOP RUNNING AHEAD

GOD Y’ALL DID MOLLY TEACH YOU NOTHING

fuck them up Keg

Yessssss kill him Keg my hero

Hasted Keg is the best man 4 attacks? She’s helping make up for a lack of Yasha

Keg getting between Nott and danger is so sweet I’m crying is she trying to make sure Molly does’t happen all over again

I would also die for Keg you guys

Sorry Phil you dead

BITCH HAS YASHA’S SWORD

FUCK HER UP

Wait until you get in the room above the trap door at least Nila

I adore her

PHIL DON’T YOU TOUCH NILA

yesssss he misses

NOTT

DONT FUCKING GO NEAR THE BARBARIAN

“IM THINKING OF REMOVING MY SPINE… CAUSE IT’S ONLY HOLDING ME BACK! :D”

holy shit Nott put her prone I’m crying I’m sorry I doubted you Nott

Fuck up the barbarian Keg yessss

Action surge means what what is that it’s cool

NAT20 YAAAAAS Keg is the BEST you guys

What I’m taking from this is that women name Ashley make the best lady characters and get the job done

why are you spending key points in non-combat when Lorenzo is still out there somewhere

Oh jeez are Cad or Nila close enough to heal Keg if she needs it??

DON’T TAKE AWAY HASTE

fuck

Liam and Matt gonna fight lol

Let Nila beat the door in

MOMMA POWERS ACTIVATE and she beats in the door HELL YEAH

Maybe she should have saved the totem for IN the trap door?

Sumalee is so concerned that she’s gonna make a mistake it’s cute

UH I KNOW IT’S A JOKE BUT YOU CAN TAKE TALIESIN’S NEW CHARACTER FROM MY COLD DEAD HANDS SOMEONE ELSE CAN DIE

Cad coming in with the heals heck yes

“A cleric who likes to heal! It’s amazing” LOL Sam. My thoughts exactly though

This isn’t going terrible but it isn’t going great and I’m worried about what they will have left when it comes time to face Lorenzo

YEAAAAAH HDYWTDT CALEB HECK YES somebody grab Yasha’s sword

also damn Caleb you get vicious with that fire

oh baby

please don’t freak again Molly isn’t here to forehead kiss you out of it

Aw first time he managed not to have issues

Maybe Lorenzo isn’t home… that would be great…

Or he’s downstairs…

Damn, Taliesin, that’s so amazingly morbid and fantastic. Just melting them away into fertilizer.

Nott apologizing for not being able to unlock the door and Caleb reassuring her that it’s not her fault. My heart.

Trapped door.

They are all getting silly xD

Oh god okay here we go

“I like pink better than purple” Liam how dare you

Manacles again ffs Matt

God a whole underground place

“He’s looking for green or blue or goth”

Fuuuuck they gotta get through at least 3 more??

And still no Lorenzo

fuck i don’t like thiiiiiiis

Lorenzo is absolutely in there. If he was upstairs he would have come down.

You’re assuming that there isn’t another way out that they could escape through and flank you

Matt’s like “I just got the downstairs map out guys”

Cad/Clay/Whatever like “let’s just?? ask??”

Oh no

stop him

“fucking Phil, ammiright?”

fuck this son of a bitch up

16 damage fuck him uppppp Nila!

fuck him uuuuup Keg!

fuck him up Clay!

fuck him up Nott!

Clay just… turning him into mulch I’m crying

Damn I’m so impressed they took care of that so well

fuck traps

PLEASE LET NILA’S BABY BE OKAY

Nila being such a mom is my favorite like I’m so here for the peaceful person who has never hurt anyone, but will fuck you UP for touching their loved ones

SOMEONE HEAL ASSAR

IM CRYING

MATT STOP IT

it’s fine I’m only crying a little

“be well. be well my son.”

I’m very much crying

Let her rip it open Matt let her do it

Okay Nila it’s okay let Nott try or Caleb then if Nott can’t

SAM stop with the 1s!!

SHES GOT HER FAMILY BACK AGAIN I CRYYYYYYY

the power of love is stronger than metal bars hell yes

“I love it when it works for the narrative!” lol Matt at his most DM-i-est

FAMILY HUG ITS FINE IM NOT CRYING

oh god I’m gonna miss Nila so much

WE LOVE YOU NILA I HOPE WE SEE YOU AGAIN SOME DAY

FIRBOLG HUG

I’ve cried way too much these past like idk 7 episodes

Nila is forever a member of the M9 y’all save that feather

it’s fine

it’s totally fine

How many members of the M9 are there now

Fjord Jester Caleb Nott Beau Molly Yasha, then Shakaste, Cali, Kiri, Keg, Nila, and now Clay.

God this was such a good episode.

Caduceus is great guys. He’s different enough from Molly not to make me heartsore, and I think he’ll bring a nice new dynamic? I’m not at all disappointed by him (not that I expected to be, I knew Taliesin wouldn’t let us down).

I’m gonna miss Nila so much. Like Marisha said, she was the softness the group needed.

I can’t believe Sumalee has never properly played before! That’s amazing! She was amazing! I hope I can be half that great at my first proper game!

And I’m so excited to see how it goes next week, live from GenCon! Excited to see how this section wraps up. It’s gonna be amazing.

#emi watches critical role #Critical Role #critical role spoilers

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mihanada · 6 years

Text

Grandmaster of Demonic Cultivation

(back to masterpost)

I might have been silently screaming this entire chapter despite knowing our main characters obviously make it out of here alive.

Chapter 53: Courage (Part 3)

No joke, this chapter really was quite awesome. Aside from the brief fight against Xue Yang in the Yi City arc and a few scuffles with the mysterious face-concealed dude, there hasn’t been much fighting or longer action sequences. Also, I finally get to find out what happened with this giant tortoise thing after hearing about it a while back through spoilers.

So, at first I thought the maple leaves were sort of funny in a cognitive dissonance sort of way, but turns out that they’re quite significant for getting the hell out of this place.

“Wei WuXian, “… What a large… tortoise…””

don’t you love his reaction.

I’m actually kind of surprised Wen Chao didn’t scream his head off the moment the tortoise-snake looked at them. He held it together until it blew out steam, I’ll give him that.

lol this line (”beast craved slaughter more than anything”) seems on par for giant beast thing except it’s probably been stuck in this underground cave for years? is the hole at the bottom of the lake even big enough for it to fit through? it’s probably starving and looking for a good meal haha

“one suddenly started twitching like a worm” very accurate description of Wen Chao, yes.

and welp there goes your only weapon. maybe aim for the eyes next time?

you know, narrative, you conveniently left out why this guy is called the “core melting hand” >.>

“...as though something was about to be sucked out of his arm...” doesn’t sound too good. I was on the edge of my seat at this part though, like damn, we have a giant tortoise snake wanting to munch people and a guy with a mysterious power called “core melting”...

What is Wang Lingjiao��s problem, geez. Literally, her three helpers are shot down and she just merrily continues to try to burn Mianmian’s face like wtf I’d at least be concerned if I was next to get an arrow in the back??

I wonder if we get to find out her fate later on...

And that’s how Wei Wuxian got his brand! Finally found out, 53 chapters into the story! ...will it be over chapter 100 by the time we get to find out how Lan Wangji got his?

Wei Wuxian really has this hero-like disregard for his own safety as a kid, and he never hesitates in helping others. He’s almost always the first to act as long as someone isn’t holding him back. But, it’s kind of ominous and scary that he’s really so flippant about himself. He even tells Jiang Cheng “there’s a piece of cooked meat here. You want to eat it?” talk about gallows humor. at the same time, this bravado really can’t last forever, can it?

“Wen Chao saw that his eyes were bloodshot and had on a terrifying expression.” think he’s talking about Jiang Cheng here. Ah, Jiang Cheng is still but a youngling, I don’t think his scary face is nearly as terrifying as when he becomes an adult haha.

I’m still wondering how anyone knew a beast was in the area but ok. Everyone is now trapped underground. I’d be concerned if I didn’t already know these guys all survive at least this part of the story.

ah, poor Mianmian, literally this happened just because Wang Lingjiao was jealous. and will we ever learn your whole name.

“Okay, enough, Jiang Cheng, stop carrying me. It’s not like my leg is broken.”

OH, you little shit. Ha. Remember when they were in the Cloud Recesses and he got whipped a bit, then was a drama queen about it and Jiang Cheng carried him? Now he’s more terribly wounded and saying ‘let me down’.

well, this also why he feels no qualms about offering to carry Lan Wangji. he gets carried by Jiang Cheng all the time lol. though, I think by ‘carry’ in this scene they mean he’s got an arm wrapped around his shoulders, otherwise there would be no need to say ‘propped him up’ earlier.

“No matter what, it’s better than waiting for our parents here and doing nothing.”

in a sort of meta sense...what irony. Wei Wuxian would be waiting forever, because he doesn’t have parents anymore.

I dunno, I like that the Yunmeng Jiang is the water sect where everyone’s good at swimming xD

ahh and despite being injured so badly (seared to a human crisp), Wei Wuxian takes charge. truly our lovable mc, right? He still does this in the present, just in a more teacher-ly sounding way.

like I keep mentioning: character consistency.

“Jiang Cheng raged, “What are you doing?!””

every time I read ‘Jiang Cheng raged’, I laugh. Ah, I really love this guy, asshole that he becomes. let me not bore you though.

also: GOD DAMNIT, NAMELESS LAN SECT DISCIPLE. shame on you. wtf you hit the guy trying to save your asses with a stray arrow you saw that arrows did absolutely nothing to this thing. he’s just lucky Wei Wuxian isn’t the vengeful sort of guy.

ahh don’t you know not to pull out things stuck in your body and preventing you from bleeding out?? >.< I guess not lol. um, lucky it wasn’t the main artery in your arm??

I probably did a low screech when Lan Wangji came to save Wei Wuxian. It’s the first time we get to see him really act reckless and out of his usual composed shell (aside from the times Wei Wuxian prodded him enough to get him to snap), and it’s to save his crush. :3 Granted, Lan Wangji does have a good character so it’s understandable how Wei Wuxian never figured out he liked him. Still, there’s something nice about knowing a guy was willing to get munched on by a giant beast for you??

ouch I winced for poor Lan Wangji’s leg though, they were in a really dire situation here. If they weren’t the main characters and we know for a fact they don’t die or get crippled here, it’d be really scary and tense

ahhh and Wei Wuxian also does not disappoint, literally throwing himself at the tortoise thing and stopping its jaws with his whole body. it’s true though, people can achieve herculean strength in desperate times. And suitably, as soon as the one he was trying to save was in the clear, it no longer could hold out

“The two rows of fangs were already deep into Lan WangJi’s blood and bones.”

uh...ew...and poor Lan Zhan. it’s a good thing this is a fantasy world where we have magic cultivation stuff because it’s doubtful he’d realistically ever be able to heal from all the damage unless he got really lucky.

“Hovering on his back, Lan WangJi’s voice possessed the rare emotional fluctuation, “How could this be pleasant?! Let me down!””

indeed, let’s savor this moment.

“Wei WuXian’s mouth refused to rest even as he was running for his life,”

Accurate. This is literally his character. xD

“Wei WuXian, Oh no, Lan Zhan’s injury will worsen again.”

see his total unconcern about his own pretty bad wounds. Instead, he’s worried about Lan Wangji’s injury, which is actually quite dire.

So...let’s see what happens next. I’m really liking this flashback so far.

(quotes from ExR’s translations)

← back・onward →

#gdc aka the liveblog of TEARS

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recentanimenews · 3 years

Text

FEATURE: Food Fight! Conquering Chinese Cuisine with True Cooking Master Boy

'Tis the season to be jolly, but even when your goal is to shine a light on older series for the sake of connecting new fans to catalog titles, Santa-themed anime is hard to come by. With that in mind, “Cruising the Crunchy-Catalog” is setting aside our holiday cheer and dashing through the snow with our regularly scheduled programming.

Since the weather is turning colder, we figured a good way to warm up is with a hot-blooded action series about ... the fine art of Chinese cuisine? Head's up, folks! True Cooking Master Boy is coming at ya!

What's True Cooking Master Boy?

Based on the "gourmet battle" manga by Etsushi Ogawa, True Cooking Master Boy (known as Shin Chuka Ichiban! in Japan) is a fall 2019 TV anime with direction by Itsuro Kawasaki and animation production by NAS with cooperation from Production I.G. Crunchyroll describes the story of the series as follows:

During the 19th century China, the protagonist, Liu Maoxing, wins the title of Super Chef and is the youngest to do so in history. His master, Zhou Yu, suggests that he broaden his skills as a chef even more, so he goes on a journey around China with his friends Shirou and Meili. Mao’s mother, Bei, had wished for everyone’s happiness and fought against the Underground Cooking Society. In order to continue his mother’s wishes and protect the Legendary Cooking Utensils from the Underground Cooking Society, Mao and his friends go on a journey...

True Cooking Master Boy is a direct sequel to the earlier Cooking Master Boy TV anime, which ran for 52 episodes from 1997-1998. But do not despair, gentle readers, because thanks to a little exposition and a few flashbacks, it's easy to dive right into the story, which picks up with Mao having his first encounters with the cooking underworld and embarking on a quest to prevent the legendary utensils from falling into the hands of evil-doers.

Iron Chef.

The central conceit of True Cooking Master Boy is that well-cooked food is a force for good in peoples' lives, and by extension, the protagonist, Super Chef Liu Maoxing, is a hero who spreads happiness through the power of his culinary efforts.

True Cooking Master Boy is a “gourmet battle” story, and that means that every conflict (regardless of the stakes) is ultimately settled through the power of cooking. This means that the main characters demonstrate increasingly improbable cooking skills, secret techniques, and “fighting styles” with all of the pomp and circumstance one would expect from a story about brawling martial artists.

No Reaction Like Overreaction.

An essential element of the “gourmet battle” story is the pattern of action, running commentary, and over-reaction, and this pattern repeats (sometimes multiple times) in the structure of every cooking contest.

It plays out like this: a chef engages in an unorthodox culinary technique, other characters observe the action and prime the audience with exposition (“That's a forbidden underworld cooking tool! How does he know how to use it?”) to ratchet up the tension, and then everyone reacts with world-shaking surprise at the deliciousness of the food that is produced.

It's a simple but effective pattern that applies equally well to the actions of both heroes and villains, and it transforms something as relatively uncomplicated as cooking a meal into a dramatic struggle of epic proportions.

Escalation and Absurdity.

The other key element to a “gourmet battle” story is that every plot development, no matter how exaggerated and silly it appears at first blush, must be played completely straight within the context of the show, and True Cooking Master Boy is absolutely sincere in its execution.

There is no winking at the camera or breaking the fourth wall when True Cooking Master Boy presents concepts as patently absurd as legendary cooking utensils that were forged from the heart of a meteorite or a secret, evil organization dedicated to conquering the world through food. Even the most ridiculous developments are treated with a sense of gravity, and this tension between tone and content makes True Cooking Master Boy a joy to watch.

Order Up.

Crunchyroll currently streams True Cooking Master Boy in 204 territories worldwide. The series is available in the original Japanese with subtitles in English, Spanish, Latin American Spanish, French, Portuguese, Italian, German, Russian, and Arabic. At the time of this writing, there are no home video releases for the TV anime or English language adaptations of the original manga, although a second cour of True Cooking Master Boy is scheduled to begin broadcasting in Japan in January of 2021.

If you're in the mood for a tasty bit of diversion that is earnest and melodramatic in equal measure, and if the series is available in your area, then please consider checking out the adventures of Mao and his fellow culinary masters in True Cooking Master Boy.

Thanks for joining us for this week's installment of “Cruising the Crunchy-Catalog.” Please be sure to tune in next time, when we get a bit more meta-textual with Anime-Gataris, a fall 2017 TV anime ostensibly about a fledgling otaku attempting to prevent the high school anime club from being shut down.

Is there a series in Crunchyroll's catalog that you think needs some more love and attention? Please send in your suggestions via email to [email protected] or post a Tweet to @gooberzilla. Your pick could inspire the next installment of “Cruising the Crunchy-Catalog!"

Paul Chapman is the host of The Greatest Movie EVER! Podcast and GME! Anime Fun Time.

Do you love writing? Do you love anime? If you have an idea for a features story, pitch it to Crunchyroll Features!

By: Paul Chapman

#Anime #News #Latest in Anime News by Crunchyroll!

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